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COPYRrCHT DEPOSIT. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



PRO AND CON 

of 

GOLF 



Written and, Conipiled',,^'^ 
by 

ALEXANDER H.- REVELL 



RAND McNALLY & COMPANY 

CHICAGO 



<^^^ 



Copyright, 1913, 
By Alexander H. Revell 



Chicago 



APR 16 1915 



'CI,A398352 



PREFACE 

GOLF is the one outdoor game that appeals 
alike to young and old, to men, women, and 
children. It is an activity at once healthfiil, 
genial, and satisfying. 

Many there are who like to ride a horse, steer 
a car, row a boat, or tighten their muscles on the 
mainsheet when the breeze is fresh. Then there 
are the woods, with gun and ever-faithful dog. 
All these, and more, are good. There is a place 
reserved, however, for this splendid game of 
golf, — combining as it does bodily exertion, men- 
tal ease and recuperation, real pleasure and exhil- 
aration — whether played alone or enhanced by 
agreeable companionship and spirited competition. 

To-day the world of gentle sport takes great 
interest in golf. Each little hamlet has a nine- 
oi an eighteen-hole course, and every large com- 
munity has from five to fifty courses. 

May it not be well, therefore, to have some 
straight drives in the literature of golf, by different 
drivers; a few brassies in the field of criticism; 
several approaches to the green of golfing com- 
ment ; and many straight putts for par in a score 
in which the writer and compiler has found much 
pleasure, making a record of the game in many 
respects different from any other? 

The thought has been to make a book from the 
viewpoint of an amateur, to be approached not 



vi PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

at all in the spirit of the schoolboy toward his 
grammar. It is hoped that one may give to 
its contents ten minutes or an hour with equal 
interest, returning again and again for another 
game and a different point of view. For example, 
in reading, the chapter on "Clubs" one should 
read only enough to satisfy him — not all view- 
points, if one does not feel so incUned. 

Golfers should benefit by the English poet's 
admonition, "Lest we forget." Words written in 
other days by those who love the sport can still 
help us to "the allure of the game," as well as to 
its science. The best advice of the past need 
not impair the new teachings ready and at hand. 

The Pro and Con of Golf may help to impart 
a higher regard for the game, and urge toward a 
better standard. It may help make one glad, 
not sad, when one's handicap is reduced, and 
foster in the field of sport the spirit of the gentle- 
man or gentlewoman, for which spirit this game, 
above all others, is preeminent. 




AN APPRECIATION 

TO those whose work and advice the author 
and compiler has used in this volume he 
desires to extend sincere thanks. 

Golf is peculiarly a game in which all who play, 
or who \\Tite about it, feel an interest in helping 
others to improve. The entente cordial is nowhere 
foimd working to better advantage than among 
the golf enthusiasts of the world. Writers and 
players partake of the same spirit. Spreading 
the gospel of good form, correct etiquette, and 
gentle courtesy, on the links or in the clubhouse, 
to players, professionals, caddies, and club help, is 
part of the thoughtful golfer's pleasure. 

Not being in the "scratch class" myself, but 
an average player, for such golf knowledge as I 
have acquired I feel genuine gratitude to certain 
professionals with whom I have played or from 
whom I have had lessons, and to many amateiurs 
who have given advice. 

Among the professionals I especially recall 
Messrs. Alexander Smith, Harry Vardon, George 
Duncan, J. J. McDermott, the two Andersons, 
David FouUs, William Marshall, Andrew Kirk- 
caldy, Stewart Gardner, Arthur Fenn, and 
Alexander and Jim Herd. Among amateurs I 
make acknowledgments also to Messrs. H. H. 
Hilton, Norman Himter, Walter J. Travis, 
Charles Evans, Jr., and Warren Wood. 

Alexander H. Revell 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Preface v 

An Appreciation vii 

CHAPTER 

I. Commencing Right i 

II. Use of Various Clubs 7 

III. To Perfect Your Game 20 

IV. Clubs 29 

V. Methods of Play 44 

VI. Approaching and Putting 68 

VII. Independence in Golf 85 

VIII. Cleverness on the Links 96 

IX. Concentration 103 

X. American Contribution to Golf . 115 

XI. Oddities of Golf 132 

XII. Hazards 158 

XIII. Restraint in Golf . 162 

XIV. Golf and Health ....... 174 

XV. Rockefeller and Golf 183 

XVI, What Constitutes a Real Golfer .188 

XVII. Rules of Golf 199 

XVIII. Handicaps 217 

XIX. The Caddie 222 

XX. Some Philosophy 236 

XXI. Social Position of Golf 239 

XXII. Historical 251 

XXIII. In the Club Library 263 

XXIV. At the Nineteenth Hole 271 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

CHAPTER I 
COMMENCING RIGHT 

WHO hungers for golfing counsel more than 
the man who has had a few lessons from 
his club professional and suddenly finds that he is 
unable to continue these lessons? An ordinary- 
established golfer is busy with his own game, 
and very rarely gives advice to the man who is 
hardly over the "beginning stage." Desultory 
advice seldom benefits the new player. 

Friendly help, after some progress has been 
achieved, is a big factor in golf. This will not be 
denied anywhere. When I had passed the 
"beginning stage," I found in making progress 
that not a few inaccuracies, personal eccentricities, 
foibles, or whatever you will, were corrected by 
the bit of advice courteously given, now and then, 
by a successful amateur or a friendly professional.. 

However, one should start right. 

At the start, one day a week is all that busy 
men can give the game; seldom more than two 
days a week. These may be reduced to half 
days. It is not easy, though it is possible, to get 
an interesting game started in that time. If the 
game has been indulged in somewhat, it can be 



2 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

sustained with a little care, but where it is possible 
for a beginner to give it considerable time in the 
first instance, it will save time afterward. A 
vacation period would be an ideal time to put 
one's mind on the game to start with. 

Pick out the course that may furnish the best 
opportunity that you can pay for, without being 
burdensome. Then be sure to talk over all your 
golf plans with the professional of that club. 
Make a friend of him and he will help you, aside 
from the value to him of the perquisite he receives. 

The first question to come up will be that of 
clubs. A better start will be made with as few 
clubs as it is reasonably possible to play with. 
These should be purchased from the professional, 
or at a first-class shop, and selected, of course, 
only under the advice of an expert. 

Until a man brings his handicap down to 
sixteen, there shotdd be no additions to the 
number used, unless he decides to add a niblick. 
He should first become well acquainted with the 
brassie, cleek, mid-iron, mashie, and putter, and 
as expert as possible with all the strokes taken 
with these five clubs. 

Driving may be well done through the greens 
with the brassie ; the mid-iron and mashie may be 
utilized for the bunkers. 

A new player should engage to take at least 
eight, or better still, sixteen lessons from the 
professional, and at least one day should elapse 
between lessons. A man should not put off start- 
ing because he cannot see his way clear to take 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 3 

all these lessons or give the time consecutively, as 
stated. The average man will not take many- 
lessons to begin with. Some friend will want 
him to play. The temptation to do so will be 
great. However, if the tempter can be put off 
two or three weeks, or even a month, it will be 
better for the later work. Lessons average 
about one hour each. 

Then, one will get much information and 
progress from books by expert players, and from 
magazines on golf. There are many who do not 
think so, but the more interested you become, the 
more intensely will yoiir mind fix itself on the 
game. Much of this comes from absorbing 
ever5rthing possible about golf. 

Try to be as exact, determined, and sincere as 
possible at the start. A fair idea of the principles, 
even though the mind grasps them in a hazy way, 
will help one's game. As improvement comes, one 
finds the haze will clear away. 

If one makes his first effort at some public or 
seaside coiu-se, he will, on return home, desire 
to belong to a golf club as convenient to his 
residence as possible. This is a matter that 
ought to receive careful attention. One shotdd 
join an organization that fits his pocketbook, 
and where he may find congenial company and 
personal friends. For many who may desire to 
enter upon this game, the cost is an important 
matter of consideration. To tell the truth, golf 
is not a low-cost game. However, it can be 
played at both a low and a high cost. 



^ 



4 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

It is the same as with automobiles. Many a man 
running an automobile finds that it costs between 
three thousand and four thousand dollars a year, 
if he has one of the finest makes. However, it 
is well known that one of the very low-priced 
cars can be run at a wonderfully low cost by those 
willing to work, to get along without a chauffeur, 
and to do their own garaging. 

As to this matter of costs, it is the same all 
through life. Thought and care will do wonders. 
A clerk at a small salary in a sporting-goods 
establishment was noticed because his trousers 
were always creased. He looked as well, or better, 
than a higher salaried employee who paid a 
tailor for doing the work. Something must be 
wrong. An investigation developed the fact 
that the young man carefully folded this article 
of wearing apparel each night and placed it 
between two pieces of thick pasteboard beneath 
the mattress of his bed. He pressed his trousers 
while he slept. 

There are some golf organizations where the 
average costs are small, and one's standing is 
not affected because this is so. However, there 
are others where the costs are hardly considered. 
Books are preferably not kept. It is the same 
as in running the high-priced automobile, — 
the enjoyment is "slightly damaged" if one keep 
close track of each and every expense. For those 
who cannot afford the so-called "swell clubs," 
just as good times are found in the low-priced 
organizations. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 5 

In most American cities the golf-club entrance 
fee nms from twenty-five dollars to two hundred 
and fifty dollars; the annual subscription is from 
about twenty-five dollars to one hundred dollars. 

There are a few clubs in this country where the 
costs are greater, but they should not be con- 
sidered in deciding the matter we have in hand. 
There are also many clubs where arrangements 
can be made to become members for a few weeks, 
with all privileges; others, where ftdl privileges 
may be had on all days except Saturdays and 
Sundays. Then there are the public courses. 
The larger and more expensive clubs are more 
particular, and usually confine their links to the 
use of members only, or of guests playing with 
members. 

I have no doubt that in many country places 
there is good golf to be had for ten dollars to 
fifteen dollars a year for club dues, and those 
who can be encouraged to join such a club would 
find it one of the best bargains of a lifetime. As 
a matter of fact, for several years I belonged to 
Tuscumbia — a nine-hole course — at Green Lake, 
Wisconsin. The annual dues of this splendid 
course were fifteen dollars a year. Let me say in 
passing that it was here that as a boy Warren 
Wood, the favorably known amateur, as well as I 
(not a boy) learned to play our first games. And 
there was a time when I gave Warren a handi- 
cap! But times have changed. 

As to the five clubs which I have mentioned, 
the cost for them will be about ten dollars. An 



6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

ordinary golf bag will cost from two dollars and 
a half up. Lessons will cost from fifty cents to 
one dollar and fifty cents each, — and golf balls 
about sixty cents each. However, it should be 
remembered that bargains are always obtainable; 
even used clubs and made-over balls may be 
obtained where the price is an important con- 
sideration. 



Most people disgusted with their game seem to 
get considerable enjoyment in being miserable, 
and in telling others how it all came about. 



CHAPTER II 
USE OF VARIOUS CLUBS 

NOW for a consideration of the play for all 
clubs. It has always been my impression 
that professionals were wrong in method, in so 
far as the order of teaching various clubs is 
concerned. I have never known a professional, 
either in book or on field, who did not start the 
beginner with the driver. I wonder if this habit 
or tendency had its origin in the lack of practice- 
putting greens or from the rules not permitting 
beginners to practice putting on the regular greens. 
Even at the present time there are many clubs 
where such rules exist and where there are no 
practice greens. 

It would hardly be right to say that the driver 
is the most difficult club to use correctly. Some 
find it easy, while others come to use one of the 
other clubs with more ease and accuracy. I 
think, however, it is generally conceded that the 
easiest clubs to play with are the shorter ones, 
the putter coming first. This is not saying that 
it is easier to make a difficult putt than to use 
an iron or a wooden club on any part of the 
fair-green. To change the expression, putting is 
the least active and the easiest part of the game 
to learn. 

I thinlc the other clubs require more work and 
study. Therefore I believe the following to be 



8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

the correct order of study for a beginner, Including 
only the clubs carried in an average bag: putter, 
mashie, mid-iron, driving iron or cleek, brassie, 
driver, and niblick. This is assuming you include 
a driver and niblick. 

In addition there are the driving iron, driving 
mashie, mashie niblick, spoon, left-hand approach- 
ing iron, and others. 

As a believer in a few rather than in many 
clubs, I shall discuss only those mentioned in the 
first list. 

Let me repeat that we have here the opinion 
of an average amateur. He offers these opinions 
with due humility and in the presence of many 
able books on golf by more expert players. He 
would not offer them but for the fact that they 
have already been a help to some who were strug- 
gling to improve their game. 

By simplicity in terms and teaching rather 
than the usual lengthy and more serious efforts 
of the average golf authority, it is my hope to 
gain and hold your attention for the short period 
necessary. My hope is that this book may en- 
courage you to take up the more technical books 
for a wider and more serious study. 

I therefore proceed to place the putter first in 
advising the beginner, and will ask him to make 
his starting play with that club. 

THE PUTTER 

There are two kinds of putters in general use 
in this country. One is the ordinary steel-blade 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 9 

putter, and the other is the wood or the flat 
metal-head putter. It is my belief that the best 
putting is accomplished with the metal-trimmed 
wood, or the metal-head putter. The general 
model of all, except the steel-blade putter, is 
something on the lines of the old Schenectady 
putter. A large number of the metal-head put- 
ters, shaped something like a driver, are in use. 
I prefer the latter because they are not in conflict 
with St. Andrews' rules. 

Putters made on the lines of the Schenectady 
have been barred in England by the rules above 
referred to, and are barred on the continent. The 
United States Golf Association permits the use of 
all such putters in this country. It would be 
better for the game if the United States Golf 
Association on this particular feature would 
endorse the judgment of those interested in golf 
across the water. It would place all players here 
more on an equality as to the use of certain shapes 
of club heads in putting. As is well known, many 
players think they cannot use the flat wood or 
metal-head putters. Others have had very little 
success with the blade or cleek putter. 

Then suppose you take yotir favorite putter 
and start on the easiest shot possible, namely, 
with three or four balls, located about a foot from 
the hole. This may be termed the easiest shot, 
although many a professional and scratch amateur 
has been known to miss an important eight-inch 
putt. 

An excellent way to stand in putting is to have 



lo PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

the heels aknost close together, toes apart, 
V-shape, standing well over the ball and with the 
hands about one-third down the grip, the right 
hand below the left hand, interlocked, using only 
the wrists. 

An imaginary line should be established between 
the ball and the hole. After making up your 
mind to hit the ball, you should pay no attention 
to the imaginary Hne or to the hole, but keep your 
eye and mind riveted on the ball alone. 

Place club on ground just ahead of ball, swing 
club once or twice on line of putt but above 
ball, to get poise and direction, then bring it 
in position behind ball, ready for stroke. The 
ball should be struck low and compact, near the 
center of the blade. The hands should be 
slightly ahead of a straight line between your eye 
and the ball, but very slightly: that is, let club 
blade lie naturally on the ground, shaft extend- 
ing straight toward the body, — then push hands 
an inch toward hole, and you are ready for shot, 
using wrists only.^ 

Let weight of club come back slowly and close 
to the ground. Reverse action should be slow, 
but hit the ball firmly, following with the club 
toward the hole. Jerking movements should be 
avoided in all golf plays. They are fatal to 
accuracy. The weight or force you use in making 
the stroke shoiild be according to the distance of 
ball from the hole. 

'In this connection "Moonlight Golf," explained farther on in 
this book (p. 132), is valuable. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF ii 

After practicing the twelve-inch shot as long 
as you feel interested, try some two-foot putts, 
then foiu'-foot, eight-foot, twenty-foot, and so 
continue. 

If you have a down-hill putt, grip the club 
loosely. This will have a tendency to hold the 
ball back somewhat. 

If, on the contrary, the ball is uphill, the grip 
should be firmer. At all times the stance should 
be easy and comfortable. The ball should be hit 
firmly, almost recklessly, remembering that you 
are far better off with your ball three feet over 
the hole than three feet short. Three feet over 
means that you give the hole a chance with firm 
confidence. This confidence is liable to continue 
for the next shot, while confidence is probably 
lost if the ball is three or four feet short of the 
hole. 

MASHIE 

The writer believes the mashie is the most 
important club in the bag. Where the ball Hes 
on the fair-green or on an average distance in 
the rough this is the club needed for the shot to 
a fixed place, — a target, — about four inches in 
diameter. The hope is to place the ball dead 
to the hole. If you use one of the longer clubs, 
when there is hope and desire to land on or near 
the green, it is always the unexpected when the 
ball lies for one putt. 

The stance for the mashie shot should be an 
open one. The left foot should be ahead of and 



12 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

away from the ball, the right foot nearer the ball 
than the left, with the body turned slightly toward 
the hole. This makes it easier for the arms to 
come through straight to the hole. The club 
should be held in the two hands about a third or 
halfway down the grip, according to distance, 
the club blade laid well back rather than straight. 
In this shot the wrists should be flexible, the arms 
somewhat rigid. There is very little use for the 
shoulders or body. The club should be taken 
back slowly. The reverse should be slow, but 
should gather speed on the down stroke, the club 
head striking the ball clean but taking a little 
earth after the club hits the ball. The club head 
should go through straight toward the hole. 

It would be a profitable thing for a thoughtful 
student of the game to take a dozen balls and 
practice this shot from the fair-green and from 
the rough. Commence with a short approach. 
Follow the putting program. Try one htmdred 
to one hundred and fifty shots. If you can secure 
a professional to coach you, so much the better. 
Don't stop at one himdred and fifty shots. Take 
up the play at another time and try it again. It 
is wonderful how much of interest and pleasant 
exercise there is in such practice. 

Keeping the head still and the eye on the ball 
is even more important in this shot than it is 
with the putter. With the putter you are going 
to hit the ball and send it somewhere nearer the 
hole, even though it may go off the line. Should 
the eye be taken off the mashie shot, your hands 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 13 

and wrists are liable to get ahead of the shot (a 
phrase understood by golfers), the blade of the 
club will shoot in the ground, and your ball pop 
up in the air for a few feet; or it may shoot on 
an angle of forty-five degrees away from the 
hole. Or you may do just the reverse, top the 
ball, which sometimes will send it quite a way 
toward or beyond the hole, with little or no 
accuracy as to line or distance. One need not be 
surprised if such a topped ball is sent to a bunker 
guarding the approach to the green, or to another 
bunker at the far side of the green. 

The extreme length of shot for a mashie is fixed 
by your ability and experience in playing that 
club. Some never use it for a shot of more than 
one hundred yards ; others can make one himdred 
and sixty yards with excellent results. 

MID-IRON 

The mid-iron is next in order. 

The stance is much the same as for a mashie 
shot, although one should stand a little farther 
from the ball. The club should be drawn back 
slowly and easily. For the long shot, at least, 
following contact with ball, hold the body toward 
the hole, the right leg turning, and come up on 
the right toes. Do not come up on side of shoe. 
This gives a less accurate follow-through. 

Under average circumstances the distance for 
the ordinary mid-iron shot is a hundred and forty 
to a hundred and sixty yards. Many profes- 
sionals use a mashie for this distance, but this 



14 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

book is intended for beginners and for average 
amateurs. 

The club should be drawn well up, but not 
exactly aroimd the neck. The long shot with a 
mid-iron should be between three quarters and a 
full stroke. - For a shorter distance, the carry-back 
of the club should be judged accordingly, but no 
shot should be made with a mid-iron with a carry- 
back of less than half a stroke. 

The ball may be hit clear and clean of earth, 
although it would be better to take a little earth 
on a direct line with the hole after the club hits 
the ball. This gives good direction to the ball. 
Taking this earth makes a good strong follow- 
through absolutely necessary. 

DRIVING IRON OR CLEEK 

This shot is much the same as with the mid- 
iron. When played well it will give from ten to 
twenty-five yards greater distance than will the 
other iron. In addition, the roll of the ball after 
it strikes the ground will be better. 

If the shot is one that calls for accuracy in 
direction, I prefer to use the cleek or driving iron 
rather than the brassie. Many times it will give 
as good a distance as the brassie, with more cer- 
tainty of direction than the latter club. How- 
ever, this should not tempt one to cut out either 
of the wooden clubs. "Play the club that fits 
the shot," is a good slogan. 

Many play all their long shots with a cleek or 
driving iron. Their usual explanation is that they 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 15 

cannot play with a wooden club, or that they 
are "a bit ofif their game." In a very important 
match this might be excusable, as in such a match 
it is hardly prudent for a player to use a club in 
which he has lost confidence for the time being. 
But constantly playing a club which, according 
to good form, does not fit the shot, throws a 
player out of form. 

As stated above, a certain club fits a certain 
shot according to the ability of the player to 
make the distance. If he is not playing well 
with the proper club, he should practice by 
himself, or with a professional, until he plays 
that club better. 

The driving iron or cleek is a handy club and is 
certainly the means of giving a player consider- 
able satisfaction when he comes to have it right, 
or nearly so. 

I always advocate the use of the wrists, and im- 
press this for all clubs, especially when it is desir- 
able to get distance with ease. 

Most players are under the impression that if 
they do not take the club back from the ball with 
its face a.t right angles, the shot will go in any 
direction. But the fact is, that when the club 
face is turned away from the ball in the back 
swing the tendency is for the wrists to turn in the 
downward swing so that the club face will be at 
right angles to the ball when it is hit. This 
turning of the wrists gives speed to the swing 
and is one of the secrets of the splendid distances 
secured by professionals. 



i6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

BRASSIE 

A brassie is a near-driver. The ground is the 
only "tee." I must begin with the same admo- 
nition as with all other clubs — take back and 
reverse slowly. 

The" stance should be what is termed "an 
open one"; that is, the left foot should be ahead 
of the ball and farther from it than the right 
foot, leaving an opportunity for the body to twm. 
with the club and the right foot to come up on 
the toes. The back swing should be only as long 
as you can make it with comfort; a short swing, 
rather than one where the left elbow bends around 
the neck, will seciu-e better control and direction. 
My swing is a long one, but I often feel I shotild 
do much better with the short swing back. 
However, while recommending the short swing 
for beginners, I Hke the appearance of the long 
swing better. 

The right elbow should hug the side fairly close 
in coming back. After the reverse, the right arm 
should go through and after the ball, and the head 
of club toward the hole. The wrists make the 
turn with the club, and in the finish the arms, 
especially the right, circle gracefully and easily 
aroimd the neck, not around the shoulders. 

I endeavor to use my wrists almost recklessly. 
Where this is done, a larger percentage of my 
shots are good shots. Extreme care for the shot, 
or overlooking the wrists, gives me a larger 
percentage of poor shots and shorter distances. 
Such might be termed "smothered shots." 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 17 

The club's downward journey should gather 
strength and speed all the way. A snap with the 
wrist when within eight inches of the ball is a 
wonderful help, but the beginner would do well 
not to try this. It will come, however, with 
practice. 

Notice your experienced caddie near the first 
tee, when, to fill up time and be rid of excess 
energy, he swings at imaginary balls. Practice 
a little in the same way, without balls. You 
can do it ; but if you think you cannot, or believe 
you're too old, the chances are you never will 
succeed. Let arms, shoulders, and club swing 
forward and backward easily in this practice, like 
the pendulum of a clock. 

SPOON 

The spoon is like the brassie but is used for a 
shorter distance, a little higher ball, and less roll. 

DRIVER 

The driver is almost on the same line as the 
brassie. Of course, the drive is what is termed a 
"tee shot"; that is, one can use a "pinch of 
sand," as the Scotchman said, to lift his ball 
from the ground. The lower the tee the better 
for the shot. A high tee is very likely to send a 
ball high, thereby losing distance. The club has 
an easy chance to get under the ball and very 
often takes the chance. However, the value in 
height of the tee depends much on the player. 



i8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Some players, in driving, do remarkably well by 
merely placing the ball on a good spot of grass. 
Others will tee their balls one-half to one inch. 
Under any circumstances the wisdom of going 
above one inch is doubted by all. 

I recall, one player who used to tee his ball 
about two inches. It looked like a miniature 
walking stick, the ball being the handle. Strange, 
but true, he acquired a very fair game, but after 
a while he gave up golf in disgust. 

Whatever plan you adopt, do not take a handful 
of sand and place your ball thereon. It looks 
badly, and in making contact of club and ball 
one is likely to frame a cushion of sand. The 
result is likely to be a ball so short that it will 
be soon reached. 

I shall not attempt to describe a hook, a pull, or 
a sliced shot. These shots are often played for 
wind or to get around obstacles. But such work 
is for professionals and crack amateurs. 

NIBLICK 

Now for the niblick. In view of the fact that 
the niblick shot is a very difficult one, it seems 
to me that the beginner may well let it alone 
until he has practiced considerably with the clubs 
intended for the field and green play. 

The sand in the ordinary bunker to-day is not 
kept as level as formerly. In season it was usual 
to have a man go over the pit or bunker very 
often with a rake or other handy tool for the 
purpose of leveling bad places. This has been 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 19 

discontinued to a considerable extent. Players 
are expected to replace sand in holes, especially 
in those made by themselves. The bunker shows 
the effect of use dining the day. It is well for 
a beginner to practice in a bunker with balls 
dropped in good and bad lies. 

In bunker shots, it is best to stand well over 
but* behind the ball, the right foot especially 
being well behind. Make your bunker shots 
stronger than you think necessary. The reason 
for this is that the ball will seldom fall anywhere 
near the distance you expect it to. When the ball 
comes out of a well-copped bunker it has to go 
high, and will therefore have very little or no roll. 

The bunker cut is becoming very popular. It 
comes from laying the niblick head back nearly 
flat, drawing the club back close to the sand, but 
not touching it in going back at any point. Hit 
the ball hard, but take as little sand as possible. 
This shot should be made with a stance that will 
give the appearance of playing away to the left 
of hole, 

I have known players to get remarkable results 
from this shot. It should be made circular 
rather than oblong, as with such a shot the effect 
is to send the ball high from the start. In all 
ordinary bunker and pit shots, striking the sand 
about an inch behind the ball, sand should be 
taken and the ball hit hard. 

No player is one hundred per cent perfect. 



CHAPTER III 
TO PERFECT YOUR GAME 

THE following outline is not given with the 
thought that it contains the "only way." 
It is the importance of having a plan that I desire 
to impress upon you, in the hope that you will 
prepare your own and then carry a copy in your 
pocket and occasionally look it over. 

When you come in from a game, feeling rather 
low-spirited on account of the poor showing 
made with a certain club, take out your plan. 
If it does not show you what is amiss, secure the 
first hour you can get with the professional, then 
add the result to your plan in one line, and donH 
forget it. This scheme has helped me wonder- 
fully. It is not necessary to memorize each sug- 
gestion, but occasionally study one at a time and 
gradually eliminate those no longer required. 

Putter 
Follow through, — wrist shot best. 
Keep eye on ball, not on the hole. 
No jerk; let club do it. 
Left hand tight. 
Hit ball firmly near bottom. 
Send club head toward hole with the ball. 

Mashie 
Back easily, fairly high. 
Lay back, don't keep blade at right angles with ball 

in going back. 
Follow through toward hole. 
Short approach — low hold. 
Don't jab. If so inclined, take club back slower and 

higher, and practice. 

20 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



Cleek and Mid-iron 

Back easily and slowly, — not a long swing, and not 

straight back. 
Lay club blade back. 
Follow through. 
Stand feet fairly close. 
Don't kill the ball. 

Driver and Brassie 

Take back and reverse slowly, arms toward body 

in stance. 
Use wrists firmly, almost recklessly. 
Gather strength all the way down. 
Turn at waist a little toward the hole. 
Club head should work as though it were going 

through the ball toward the hole. 
Try two-thirds swing back. 

Grass 

Nib and mashie. 

Straight back, — high. 

Follow through toward hole. 

Hit hard, with club describing a circle. 

Bunker 

Close up to cop; pull across ball with left arm. 
Stand away behind ball and cut out when necessary. 
If play in sand, hit about one inch behind ball. 
When ball is on cop, stand on level of bunker, if 

possible. 
When foot is on cop, bend head to contour of cop. 
Sand shots, like all others, shoiild have practice with a 

professional. 

General 

Eye most important. 

Depend on club rather than on strength. 

Follow through. 

Let club do the work. 

Careful about hands ahead of ball, — a common error. 

Don't sway body. 

Head straight on ball. 



2 2 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Use arms from hands up, instead of from shoulders 

down. 
Don't press on any shot. 
Let left arm do some work. Right-handed men let 

that hand and arm do all, with the consequence 

that left arm has restraining influence. 
Mistake to use all one's strength. 
Let club go right "through ball." 
Do not play any shot until comfortably ready, but 

great deliberation is an ease-destroyer. 
Let club lie naturally in stance. 
Use an imaginery line and hit into it with the club 

head. 
Make ascent and descent the same; if variation, hit 

out past straight line. Keep on going. Do not 

quit on last half of stroke. 
Never lunge at ball. 
Always finish full stroke with right-hand knuckles 

pointing skyward. 

THE IMPORTANCE OF FORM 

To me it has always seemed strange that many 
who follow and love the game of golf should not 
secure a certain form which can be approved by 
professionals. This does not mean a form that 
may insure expert play. It means that good 
form should precede all play. 

What is meant by "good form" is an approved 
stance, and a use of the clubs with a style ap- 
proaching, if not strictly following, the best 
standards. "A freak player is a blot on the 
landscape." 

For example, there are players who do not sole 
their clubs before making the shots aside from 
those in a bunker. In other words, they make 
the shot on the fair-green, or in the rough, much 
as the rules compel a player to treat his shot in 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 23 

a bunker or a hazard. There is a considerable 
percentage of penalty against such players in 
every shot they make. Yet, having learned to 
knock the ball somewhere in that way, they keep 
on doing it year after year. 

Many players pay little attention to advice 
or lessons. Such men, I have noticed, swing 
their arms, shoulders, and body all together in 
their desire to hit the ball and drive it a long 
distance. The result is that the shoulders drop, 
the eyes are forced, and the club hits the ground 
with a dull thud. Dropping the shoiilders makes 
it almost impossible to keep the eyes on the ball. 
With all their strength such players advance the 
balls only from fifty to a hundred yards. A 
little practice with a professional would show them 
that in acquiring good form and using only the 
strength of the arms and wrists, keeping the 
body almost still, they would attain to a game 
that would enable them more often to hit the 
ball clean and get from one hundred sixty to two 
himdred yards. Such assistance as the body can 
give may well come with time and acquired form. 

Again, there are players who give up some 
clubs too quickly because of lack of success, using 
a club with which, for the time being, they gain 
more confidence. It might be all right for once, 
to lay aside a club in which for the time being 
you have lost confidence, but in the long nm 
the method is unwise. 

Not infrequently one meets a player who feels 
that for a long shot he can do better with the 



24 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

iron than with a wooden club, and who therefore 
plays the iron all the time. Such a player 
ordinarily has not the patience to employ a 
professional, or practice alone with his wooden 
clubs for an hour or two once or twice a week. 
Although I am a strong believer in practicing 
alone, I think an hour with a professional is 
better than three hours alone. 

Many beginners take a few lessons and do 
remarkably well. Then they accept a challenge 
to play a game, and start in to use their wooden 
clubs. Remembering how well they did prac- 
ticing viith the driver and the brassie, they expect 
the first few balls to go right. Usually they are 
disappointed. Instead of sticking it out with the 
knowledge they have paid for and acquired, their 
desire to make a good showing or to defeat their 
opponent beguiles them into changing to irons 
at once. This makes for general all-roimd waste. 

The same recreancy is common in other points 
of the game. Stating it a little differently, the 
player takes lessons, and temporarily acquires 
good form. He goes out to play a game, does 
poorly for a few holes, and then, consciously or 
not, drops into the feeling that he could play 
better with his old form (for that game, at any 
rate). The change is made, and the time spent 
in practicing is thus wasted. The chances are 
that if the player had stuck to his new form for 
the entire eighteen holes his score would have 
been equally good. And there would have been 
this advantage — in holding to the new form, 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 25 

under the instructions received, his improvement 
would have been real and along the lines of well- 
directed play. Such improvement as comes with 
the old and imgraceful form, even over a period 
of months or years, is very slight. 

Practice swinging, without a ball, each of the 
clubs most commonly used. Think of a clock 
pendulum, and acqmre rhythm. As stated be- 
fore, notice an experienced caddie practicing 
without a ball while waiting for his employer's 
turn to start. You may not do it well, but you 
can train yourself to come as nearly as possible, 
and yotir game will improve. 

SET VERSUS RELAXED MUSCLES 

In playing golf I often wonder if the players 
know the meaning of "Follow through" and 
"Don't press." Both of these admonitions are 
often used by players, as well as by writers of 
golfing articles and books. "Terms" look easy, 
but many average players do not know just 
what the terms amoimt to. 

"Follow through" means to let the club head 
go out straight to the hole. The take-back must 
be along lines that will permit it, or it cannot be 
done. Then, after the ball is hit, the arms, 
especially the left, should be extended toward 
the hole just before making the break with the 
wrists. That permits the club to come grace- 
fully aroimd the neck. If you will try this slowly, 
without a ball, you will soon get the idea fixed in 
yoiir mind. 



26 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

The other admonition, "Don't press," is 
directly associated with the above; therefore let 
me change the expression and say: "Relax." 
Cut out the tenseness with which many of the 
average players, especially those more than thirty 
to thirty-five years of age, approach the tee or 
their average shot through the field. 

After having practiced relaxation in the swing- 
ing of the club before approaching the tee, the 
average player acts on the tee as though he had 
"just one blow with which to kill an ox." Every 
muscle is taut, fixed, rigid, to get the greatest 
power into said blow. This is all wrong. Rather 
would it be better to use carelessness, recklessness, 
lightness, and ease than to approach the shot 
with this feeling of strain. 

In other words, "as easy in play as in practice" 
will show one that he will do just as well if easy 
as he will with rigid work. All the time his game 
will be making for improvement instead of 
standing still or fostering ultimate discourage- 
ment. 

There is very small chance of getting a good 
game or a good "follow-through" with the 
"set-muscle" form. With a little practice, the 
easy carry of the arms, the flexible wrist, will give 
a man wonderful distance. His energy is con- 
served and he finds himself coming to the seven- 
teenth and eighteenth holes feeling equal to taking 
on nine holes more, if he wishes. The man who 
plays the game with set muscles is all the time 
stiffening those muscles and wasting energy, and 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 27 

he is tired out in mind and body on the eighteenth 
green. This tenseness usually gives him a poor 
score, especially toward the end, — the last four 
or five holes, — and, as a general thing, on those 
holes you will find such a man complaining about 
the way his game has gone to pieces; his caddie 
is no good, his clubs are wrong, and altogether 
he is downhearted. The spirit of the good sport 
he probably is, has departed. The other method 
will bring the man around light and easy, even in 
the presence of adversity on the links. 

PROCEDURE 

I am very glad to have an authority on the 
value of a good eye, wrist, and forearm, like 
Christy Mathewson, the star pitcher of the New 
York Giants, endorse the suggestion as to begin- 
ners starting with the putter and mashie rather 
than with the driver. This is what he said on 
this point in a recent article: 

"The average beginner will strain to become 
a good driver first. That, to my notion, is the 
wrong end at which to start, although I went at 
it myself from that direction. The explanation 
of this probably is that it feels so good to make 
a long drive. But a messed-up drive can be 
recovered and made up for, while a missed putt 
or a bad approach has lost many a match. There- 
fore I would recommend to the beginner that he 
practice the short game as much as possible, the 
approach and putting. 

"If a man lives in the country, or even in the 



28 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

suburbs of a great city, he can often do this at 
home by sinking a flower pot in his back yard 
and smoothing out the ground around it, so that 
he has some of the conditions of the ordinary 
green. Then he can do his driving when he goes 
out to the links." 



Golf is a game in which mighty 
few of us cash in all our hopes. 



CHAPTER IV 
CLUBS 

A GOLFER often is known by the clubs he 
carries. The number of clubs in the caddie 
bag does not necessarily distinguish the good 
player. Next to good form I consider the subject 
of clubs most important. I trust the reader will 
agree, therefore, that not one of the following 
pages on this subject is wasted, notwithstanding 
reiteration. 

It is and has been something of a fad among 
many young golfers to carry from nine to twelve 
clubs in a big hooded caddie bag, which still has 
sufficient room for a sweater, a pair of shoes, 
perhaps a suit of underwear, and often a change 
of linen. But the chances are that the man who 
carries this extraordinary bag does not pose as an 
extra good golfer. It has been thought all right 
to affect this style of bag. 

Did the player have use for all the clubs? In 
his own words, quite often the answer to that 
query is: "I have two good drivers, and when 
I go to another course I like to have them handy 
in case of accident. Half the clubs I carry I 
never use. But there's nothing like having an 
assortment." 

One critic naively remarks, however, that as a 
man may be judged by the clothes he wears, so 
may a golfer be known by the clubs he keeps. He 

29 



30 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



adds that the large variety of wooden and iron- 
headed weapons are in many instances not war- 
ranted by the results obtained. How often has 
the care-free caddie, familiar with the course, 
been known to reel off a score close to the course 
record, aided only by three rather decrepit 




Consider the Willies of the field, they toil not, neither do they 

spin; but Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed 

like one of these 

looking if not wholly promiscuous clubs, tucked 
under his arm in lieu of a caddie-bag receptacle! 
The carefully groomed fellow draws the club 
of his choice from a bag bursting with sticks, 
only to foozle, to the immense delight of the 
urchin who is carrjdng that formidable looking 
bag. Sometimes in important matches profes- 
sionals have been known to show some concern. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 31 

and take out an extra driver or two, or a relief 
brassie. J. H. Taylor carried a left-handed 
iron when he played at the Chicago Golf Club 
in the famous world championship more than a 
decade ago, in which chief honors were captured 
by his rival from the Isle of Jersey, Harry 
Vardon. It was said by those who knew Taylor 
best that he had scorned to have such a club in 
his bag until his visit to the Chicago Golf Club. 
He feared there might be a shot which in a close 
medal-play contest would prove disastrous to his 
chances of victory unless it were carefully played 
with a left-handed club. He was right, as far 
as that goes; the shot came early in the contest, 
at the third green on the first round. But for 
that extra iron in his bag he might have lost two 
strokes at that hole. 

With the average player, however, the possi- 
bility of breaking a club is hardly a matter for 
alarm, and at the worst the brassie can be made 
an effectual substitute for the driver. It often 
happens that some well-known player will 
develop a fondness for a particular club, and as 
confidence increases he can use that particular 
club on an astonishingly large number of shots. 

There is a senseless excuse which not a few 
amateurs give for the array of wood and steel 
which their caddie bags present — -that they hope 
if they are "off" one club they may be "on" 
another. On occasion this hope may not be 
without foundation. Take, for instance, when a 
man suddenly shifts from a light to a short. 



32 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

heavy driver with beneficial results. He has 
probably made the change in desperation, and 
then, as he sees himself getting away a series of 
long, straight tee shots, concludes that life is 
worth living after all. This newly acquired 
accuracy may last only for a roimd or two, or 
until he becomes accustomed to the "feel" of 
the new club. Because of its greater weight, 
pressing becomes a matter of some difl&culty for 
a time. Good results obtained in this artificial 
way are neither permanent nor satisfactory. 

CLUBS IN USE AND DISCARD 

"To the struggling amateur, who, regarding his 
game as well-nigh hopeless, has in desperation 
ransacked the professional's shop in an endeavor 
to collect a new set of clubs likely to serve him 
better, some satisfaction may be gleaned from a 
few words of advice offered by Edward Ray, open 
champion of Great Britain," says the New York 
Sun. 

"Until a perfect set is obtained, the champion 
says, it must be obvious to all that it will be 
necessary to buy and test many clubs. As a 
natural result, a large percentage of the weapons 
will find a resting place in lockers, though it not 
infrequently happens that drivers and irons long 
since thrown aside in disgust are brought forth 
and produce such results as to make the owner 
wonder what in the world he has been thinking 
about all the time. 

"No type of club is so often tried, discarded. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 33 

and tried again as a putter, which one day seems 
possessed of some magic power and the next 
worse than useless. 

"Although a great deal of this shifting about is 
after all a mere fancy, it is equally true that no 
man ever plays really well without having first 
purchased and tried scores of clubs. His path to 
proficiency is literally strewn with them. There 
is likewise little doubt that much of this experi- 
menting is due to ignorance of what is best for 
one's style of play. 

"Often a club that at first appeals to the player 
and then fails to come up to expectations has been 
discarded all too hastily in favor of a new purchase. 
Then again, when a favorite is broken it rarely 
matters how exact the duplicate may be, the new 
member of the kit rarely performs its work quite 
as satisfactorily as the old, though if given a little 
time it is likely to become an equally willing 
servant. 

"The golfer when selecting a club should be 
carefiil to get one that suits his style, for he, best 
of all persons, is the one to know what amount of 
'feel' he requires in the shaft. If his swing be of 
the slow, deliberate kind, then a stifiE shaft is 
useless. 

"It's not sheer weight that produces the long 
ball, but accurate timing; and to bring that about 
the golfer shotdd use a club that he can swing 
without effort. 

"Every golfer knows, or should know, that the 
shaft is the most important part of the club; and 



34 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

therefore when a purchase is being made care 
should be taken to see that the shaft is right. 
Good hickory is becoming scarcer every year, and 
the purchaser must not complain if asked to pay 
an additional half dollar for a club which has a 
perfect shaft. No matter how good the head may 
be, it is useless if the shaft is without life, a shaft 
which, pressed on the ground, stays where it has 
been forced. A good stick should always resume 
the original shape when pressure is put upon it. 
"In considering scared or socket clubs, Ray 
prefers the scared, believing that there is less 
give in the neck; but the professional ranks are 
pretty evenly divided on the question. Where 
an amateur often makes a mistake, in Ray's 
opinion, is in the grip. He comes to the con- 
clusion that his grip is too thin, and brings it to 
the professional to have it thickened. But in 
doing so he is displacing a certain amount of 
weight. The head of the club now feels lighter, 
and the balance is partly destroyed. He soon 
brings it back, not understanding the reason, to 
have a little weight added. When this is done the 
club is totally different, and is soon discarded." 

HOW TO PICK CLUBS 

"The unusual or freak clubs represent to a 
certain extent the theoretical side of golf. I have 
used many of these clubs, and some of them I 
have liked very much," says Charles (Chick) 
Evans. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 35 

"I never have used a Schenectady putter be- 
cause, from my point of view, it would be a waste 
of time to practice to acqmre the skillful use of it 
as long as it remains unsanctioned by the powers 
that be. From observation I should say it is a 
great aid to good putting, and is perhaps the 
most effective of all the new inventions. But as 
long as a large portion of the golfing world does 
not consider it a golf club I shall not use it. 

"As a very young player, I consider it my part 
to do nothing to influence golf legislation, and to 
accept unquestioningly existent golf rules. 

"The only limit to the average golfer's purchase 
of new clubs seems to be his purse. Very few 
players continue to use the same clubs year after 
year. I am well acquainted with a prominent 
golfer who has two lockers filled with clubs, and 
he is now contemplating setting up a third to 
relieve the congestion in the other two. 

"My own much-treasured set is the result of 
experiments with about twenty-five clubs. My 
bag really contains the selection of an accumula- 
tion. No golfer can go into a shop and buy a set 
— driver, brassie, mid-iron, mashie, and putter — 
and be satisfied with his clubs. I believe in trying 
out clubs slowly, and when they show satisfactory 
results they should be kept, only to be changed 
after great deliberation. This applies most par- 
ticularly to iron clubs. 

"Of course one is compelled to put in new shafts 
from time to time, but the same angle and loft 
are always there, and I do not believe they are 



36 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

exactly the same in any two clubs. Many of my 
clubs I consider old friends, and an accident to 
one is a tragedy. My mashie is my favorite club, 
and duplicating its shaft is a trying and difficult 
task for me. 

"In the North and South championship at 
Pinehurst, the shaft of my mashie cracked at the 
second hole. I sent it to the shop for repair and 
it was returned to me at the tenth hole. At 
the nineteenth hole it cracked the length of the 
shaft, and my shot was ruined. 

"I returned shaft and head to my bag and when 
I reached Chicago the shaft was duplicated as 
nearly as possible. There is everything in the 
accustomed feel of an old club, and only time can 
break in a new one. 

"No club can turn a poor player into a fine one. 
The man behind the club must always remain 
the important factor. In golf as in more serious 
things of life, it is a good plan to prove all things. 
Hold fast to that which is good." 

NEW IDEAS IN CLUBS 

The beginner must expect to see many new 
and attractive shapes in golf clubs, and no doubt 
he will buy one or two in the hope of improving 
his play. There is a serious chance of overdoing 
this chapter on clubs, principally because of repe- 
tition, but different viewpoints prove not only 
interesting but absorbingly instructive. The fol- 
lowing article gives much good advice to new- 
comers on the links: 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 37 

"According to H. H. Hilton, the British golfer, 
comparatively little credit is given to one's clubs 
for improvement in play. Nine times out of 
ten the ball gets all the praise. 

"Oddly enough, out of the mass of inventions 
the two ideas which may be said to have a strong 
bearing upon the make and shape of present- 
day clubs both emanated from players who 
fashioned a club with a view to improving their 
own game. Across ' the water Henry Lamb 
invented the bulger, while the socketless iron 
club head was the idea of Frank Fairlie. 

"Back in about 1889 the buJger form of head 
first made its appearance, and it is generally 
conceded this is the parent club of the present- 
day short, round head. 

"While it may be true that a large percentage 
of the tools found in the clubmakers' shops are 
devoid of any suspicion of bulge in the face, it is 
likewise noticeable that nearly every club one 
picks up has the face of the head in front of the 
shaft. Prior to the appearance of the bulger 
the face of the club head was always behind the 
line of the shaft. 

"In commenting on that Hilton says the intro- 
duction of the bulger stamp of club is the only 
material change which has taken place in the 
ma,ke and shape of wooden clubs in the last thirty 
years. To carry the analysis further Hilton says : 

" ' We use socket clubs in place of spliced clubs 
mainly for the reason that the club maker decided 
this question for us. He found that by the aid 



38 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

of machinery it was a much simpler thing for 
him to bind the shaft and the head together by- 
means of the socket screw principle, and, having 
found this out, he was not at all likely to revert 
to the old and comparatively laborious method 
of splicing the shaft and the head together. Had 
it not been for the introduction of the rubber- 
cx)red ball it is probable the socket club would 
have had a short reign, as I cannot imagine the 
present delicate examples of the club makers' 
art long withstanding the concussion of the old 
solid ball. There are still a nimiber of players 
who remain faithful to the old clubs put together 
on the spliced principle, and, personally, I think 
they are wise, as it is much the more stable prin- 
ciple of the two and is much more serviceable for 
hard work through the green. In the bags of 
nearly all first-class players is to be found at 
least one club in which the shaft is spliced to 
the head. 

** 'I never have come across a socket brassie 
with which I could play with the slightest degree 
of confidence, as I have found that occasionally 
one is apt to play appallingly bad shots with 
them, due to the club head not coming through 
when attempting to take turf, and in consequence 
I still remain faithful to the old stamp of club 
and will use it for heavy work through the course, 
and both my short brassie and spoon, which have 
the shaft spliced to the head.' 

"The foregoing must furnish food for reflection 
to those who have followed Hilton round the 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 39 

links. Unquestionably the best shot in his bag 
is the brassie or spoon to the green. His direc- 
tion with either of these weapons in his hands is 
well-nigh mechanical, and he often goes through 
a day's play without once using a cleek or driv- 
ing iron." 

LIBERAL BASIS OF GOLF 

Mark Allerton has given considerable attention 
to the golf player's use of balls and clubs. He 
contends the player has a wide field for selection 
and is not bound by drastic regulations. 

"There are a number of eminent golfers who 
seem to be of the opinion that the game is being 
played in too free and easy a manner," says Mr. 
Allerton, "Now and again these critics agitate 
for a restriction of the golfer's liberty, and if the 
agitation has a habit of dying down as quickly 
as it flared into life it leaves behind it the inde- 
finable suspicion that we are doing too much as 
we like. For example, not so very long ago the 
politicians of the game were clamoring for a new 
ruHng authority. A mild sort of revolution arose, 
and among the revolutionaries there was no lack 
of last-ditchers. But time went on, and now the 
only attacks that are made on St. Andrews may 
be reckoned of negligible importance. 

"Then somebody insisted that we ought to 
have a new code of rules, and since he and his 
supporters refused to be happy till they got it, a 
new code of rules was drawn up, and the only 
remarkable thing about it is that it does n't seem 



49 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

to have made very much difference. After that 
the die-hards determined that the rubber-cored 
ball must really go, and since in their widsom 
they realized that nothing in heaven above or 
on the earth beneath or in the waters luider the 
earth would persuade golfers to return to the 
guttie ball, they agitated for a standard ball. 
They insisted that nobody ought to be allowed 
to enter for a competition who played with a ball 
that did not float and that did not conform to 
certain dimensions as regards cover and to certain 
material as regards core. This agitation is still 
going on more or less fitfully, and I mention it not 
to belittle the efforts of its supporters, but to 
suggest that it is a part of the general tendency 
to curtail the ancient rights of the golfer to play 
with any spherical object he chooses provided it 
be small enough to go into the hole. 

"The most recent attempt to restrict the golfer's 
license is in the direction of the number of clubs 
he shall carry with him, or rather cause to be 
carried with him. It has been estimated that the 
number ought to be limited to six, which is 
perhaps one too few, for most of us would feel 
unhappy did we not have at hand at least a driver, 
a brassie, a cleek, an iron, a mashie, a niblick, 
and a putter. From this list it would be difficult 
to know which club to discard. Some of us would 
fasten on the putter, arguing that we could not 
play less inexpertly if we used a niblick on the 
green. Now it has been noted that Braid pins 
his faith to the thirteen clubs — surely a lucky 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 41 

number — and many players in emulation of Braid 
fill their bag with a forest of wooden clubs sup- 
ported by a collection of irons of every conceivable 
shape and possessing hybrid names. 

"I do not for a moment suppose that the 
objection to the multiplicity of clubs is due to the 
fact that they give their possessor an advantage 
over his rival; on the contrary, it is usually to be 
found that the man with a driver, a rusty iron 
club, and a putter can give strokes to the player 
who fills his bag with a specimen of every known 
club. We suspect that the latter, in his frantic 
desire to get the better of the difficulties of the 
game, resorts to the purchasing of every con- 
ceivable weapon of which he has seen other people 
make good use. At the same time it must be 
admitted that the temptation to add to one's 
impedimenta is very great. The majority of 
golfers have stacked up in an odd comer of their 
houses a vast number of clubs purchased in weak 
moments, and the task of selecting a bagful is 
often very difficult. Each club seems to cry aloud 
its claim to be included in the list. The insistence 
of this cleek rivals the claims of that. Accord- 
ingly, for the sake of peace, we include the greater 
proportion of the lot. 

" Once upon a time I was presented with a left- 
handed mashie of rare beauty. Seldom have I 
seen a club so luxuriously finished. To gaze upon 
it filled me with the longing to be a left-handed 
player. For months I reserved a place in my 
bag for this left-handed club, not because I hoped 



42 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

to use it but because I fancied that the sight of 
my readiness for all emergencies might strike 
terror and awe into the heart of my opponent. 
And I never had occasion to use it. Never, that 
is, until one day before starting off to a course 
where One .could not always depend upon getting 
a caddie I reduced my kit to a minimum, and the 
left-handed club was left at home. During that 
very match my ball, after an inexcusably bad tee 
shot, nestled up against a furze bush so that with 
any right-handed club it was impossible to make 
a stroke. My left-handed club would have saved 
the situation — and I had left it at home. Herein 
lies room for the argument that if you carry a club 
for seven years you will find a use for it. 

"On the other hand, this narrative gives away 
the case of the man who likes a multitude of clubs. 
When he suspects that he may have to carry them 
himself he leaves all but the essential implements 
at home. He has no desire to make himself a 
beast of burden. He knows by experience that 
the bagful of clubs that weighs so many pounds 
on the first tee weighs as many hundredweights 
on the eighteenth. He discovers that spare 
drivers and hybrid irons and a change of putters 
are by no means essential. The strongest point 
in the case of those who urge the limiting of the 
number of clubs is that of humanity. The 
spectacle of a small boy laboring round the links 
with a caddie bag which contains a large and 
heterogeneous assortment of clubs is not a pleasant 
one. Since the possessor of the collection brings 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 43 

into play but a small proportion, and that 
proportion uses but inefficiently, the labor appears 
to be reasonless. The merciful golfer is merciful 
to his caddie." 



Many a golfer is chesty from thinking 
how many golf cups are coming to him. 



CHAPTER V 
METHODS OF PLAY 

THE progress of a golfer is slow. Some 
consider it tedious; others are interested 
all along the highway from the lightest ignorance 
to brilliant accomplishment. 

A British writer of ability, under the nom de 
plume of "A Wandering Player," points out the 
responsibilities of a champion to all other players 
of his time, especially in methods of playing the 
game. 

The English writer says that probably no one 
has given so much advice about the playing of 
golf as has J. H. Taylor, five times gold-medal 
champion of England, and goes on to say: "At 
Mid-Surrey he is engaged in tuition all the time — ■ 
except when he is laying out courses in France, 
Italy, Egypt, or some other foreign parts. He has 
the merit as a tutor of being just a trifle dogmatic; 
he is logical and discerning, and he has expounded 
his views clearly and comprehensively. Let us 
then briefly consider some of the points of the 
Taylor way. 

" It is possible to have a more beautiful style in 
driving than Taylor has, and he would not put 
his own driving forward as the kind of thing to 
give joyous emotion to those who appreciate 
athletic grace in movement. But athletic style 
is less prevalent now than it used to be. The 

44 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 45 

rubber-cored ball does not demand style as the 
guttie did; and it has been found that the long 
swings and fine finishes do not get the long holes 
in fours any better than some othdr ways which 
are easier, and indeed in a manner more effective. 

"Taylor's principles, of course, are sound 
enough. Only one champion of modem times 
has dared to disregard any of the few essential 
principles or cardinal tenets of golfing belief. 

"Taylor's style is effective, and it is effective- 
ness that he teaches. There was no better or 
more effective driving done in a recent cham- 
pionship than his. In its results and in its 
certainty it was magnificent, and one may be sure 
that it was on his driving as much as anything 
that he won this championship — not on the 
length of it, but on that which is even better than 
length. 

"In the old days Taylor won championships on 
his marvelous mashie play, which gained him a 
reputation that no other player has ever gained 
for one particular stroke. I had a strong feeling 
that he won his fourth championship at Deal 
a few years ago as much on his half and three- 
quarter iron shots as an3^hing else. They were 
marvels of accuracy. And now he wins a cham- 
pionship on his driving. 

"Once upon a time Taylor explained in an 
interesting way how he viewed his own driving 
and how he gained the power that he has with 
his comparatively short swing. 

"He is what we may call an open stancer. 



46 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

He insists that stance and character of swing 
must be adapted to each other in a special way; 
that for the open stance only a round-the-body 
swing is suitable ; and that when a man plays an 
upright sort of swing with a square stance his 
right elbow must inevitably leave his side. That 
is one of the worst and most frequent faults in 
driving, though one often little suspected or 
understood. 

"If he stood square, says the champion, he 
feels he would lose direction; if his swing were 
upright, he thinks he would lose distance; and if 
his right elbow were allowed to leave his side, then 
he is sure he would lose power. Direction, dis- 
tance, and power are the three essentials of good 
driving. So he is all for the open stance and the 
flat swing. 

"One of the chief merits and necessities is that 
in the back-swing the wrists do not permit the 
head of the club to move outward and backward 
in the line of flight behind the ball, as it has been 
preached they should do, but begin to circle the 
club round at once. By this means the right 
elbow is kept to the side. 

"The importance of this elbow movement is 
very great. It might be safe to say that more 
than half the golfers of to-day do it wrongly and 
suffer accordingly. Taylor urges that an initial 
turn of the wrists at the very beginning of the 
swing is extremely important. Then, as to the 
arm movement, he insists that the right elbow 
should be kept close to the side and should move 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 47 

round the side irrespective of any movement of 
the body. That makes for a smooth, fiat sv^dng. 
A sense of enormous gain in power is certainly the 
result. Taylor says that he feels a gain of half 
as much power again by this movement in 
comparison with an upright swing. The initial 
wrist movement induces it. But he warns those 
who think of trying to flatten their swing, and 
so gain some of the power which he certainly has, 
against allowing excessive body movement, to 
which they will be very liable. 

"As to pitching with the mashie — Taylor's most 
celebrated and successful shot, and the shot that 
probably bothers inexperienced players more 
than any other — he has given advice which is 
more pointed than such advice generally is. 

"He warns you against full swings with the 
mashie based on the idea that you get more length 
than with shorter ones — which, in play with iron 
clubs, is not the case — and urges that when a 
swing only a little past the vertical, which should 
be regarded as a full swing with the mashie, is not 
enough, a club of higher power should be taken. 

"When pla3^ng a short-pitch shot he would have 
the body half turned round toward the hole, as if 
one were playing too much to the left, and the face 
of the club turned slightly outward, the stance 
being very open and the weight on the right foot. 
The left wrist must be turned inward in taking the 
club back. A special item of instruction, which 
is not generally known, is that, according to this 
master, the left wrist should turn the club slightly 



48 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

in the bend of the forefinger of the other hand. 
Otherwise the wrist movement could not be 
completely successful. 

"At the time of impact the right hand must 
not be allowed to get into the business, as it so 
often is, in the mistaken idea on the part of the 
player that something must be done at this critical 
moment to lift the ball up. The effect of right- 
hand work at such a moment is to make the ball 
run, not to loft it and make it stop nearly dead on 
pitching, as is desired." 

Another view of Taylor's play is expressed in 
the following: 

" Taylor's cut stroke with his mashie is a picture 
and has often been declared ideal. He stands with 
the face of his club turned slightly away from the 
ball. It seems as if he always aims to the left 
of the pin and cuts the ball. That being his 
natural method, his excellence at the cut mashie 
stroke is understandable. He is never caught 
trying to coax the rubber core ; he gives it a forceful 
blow every time." 

Vardon's famous push shot has been copied the 
world over, and many an American has tried to 
master it. Vardon admires the way Braid plays 
this particular shot. 

"If you want to see the push shot played to 
perfection," says the former British champion, 
"there is nobody better to watch than Braid. 
Addressing the ball with his hands a little in front 
of it, he takes the club back in a more upright 
manner than for the ordinary stroke. Then, 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 49 

at the moment of impact, his arms lengthen, or at 
any rate, straighten, and he pushes them through 
as he gives the object a mighty thump." 

SUPER-GOLF 

The men who make and who change golf 
courses were given consideration some time ago. 
An editorial in The Nation deserves careful 
attention. If one starts reading this article, the 
chances are the interest will continue to the end. 
The editorial strikes out in the following manner : 

"The historic and shifting contest between the 
makers of armor and the makers of guns, to see 
which can get the better of the other, has its 
likeness in what has for sometime been going on 
in the game of golf. Players and the architects 
of the links are continually pitting their wits 
against each other. Every improvement in 
clubs or balls is but a signal for making the 
courses harder. 

"The average skill of golfers is all the time 
increasing; but greens committees display a 
fiendish ingenuity in seeing to it that the average 
score does not improve. You will see malignant 
officials on the watch for a poor shot that luckily 
escapes a severe penalty, and then darkly mutter- 
ing to themselves that such a thing shall not 
happen again. Sure enough, the next time a ball 
is sliced to the same spot it finds a new-made 
grave awaiting it — one of the places rightly 
named 'pits,' full as they are of lost souls and 
wailing and gnashing of teeth. 



50 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"There is growing complaint, in England as 
well as in this country, that the authorities of 
the links are in pursuit of a kind of super-golf. 
No one demands that the courses be made as 
easy as once was the custom. There is no objec- 
tion to difficulties and hazards, as such. The 
protest is against appl3dng higher mathematics 
to the game. It is becoming the fashion to lay 
out links on the basis of the most precise multiples 
of the most precise shots. Opportunity to 're- 
cover' from an imperfect stroke is scoffed at. 
The wages of golfing sin — or even peccadillo — is 
death. Your drive must be exactly 198 yards. 
2 feet, and 3 inches; and the ball must come to 
rest within an area, no bigger than Sir Walter 
Raleigh's coat. If you hit farther, you are in 
trouble; if you fall shorter, you cannot possibly 
carry the bunker guarding the green. Ten feet 
to the right puts you where you can't see the hole; 
while a couple of yards to the left will send you 
down a slope into the rough. 

"So it goes, hole after hole; every stroke must 
be perfect on pain of certain punishment. The 
player has to study the wind as carefully as a 
marksman at a rifle range; and in the hands of 
professionals and experts golf is tending toward 
a combination of ballistics and the integral cal- 
culus. 

"It is maintained, to be sure, that these refine- 
ments and niceties of golf not only test the 
player's skill but are for his mental discipline and 
moral good. He is thus compelled to concentrate, 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 51 

knowing that a single moment of relaxed attention 
means his undoing. And we suppose that, when 
he finds himself in a cimningly placed trap, he is 
expected to meditate piously on the wonderful 
intellect of the man who spread that snare for 
his feet. Anyhow, it is said, his coolness and 
reserves of spiritual strength will be developed 
under his misfortunes. 

"But this recalls what the statesman said about 
the blessings of adversity for his party. 'Yes,' 
he remarked, ' but adversity must n't last too 
long.' It must not on the links, lest tempers, 
instead of being braced by difficult}^, become 
apparently soured by the sense of diabolically 
contrived punishments. Every golf club that 
persists in adding hazard to hazard, and calcu- 
lating distances with transit and chain, recruits 
a growing corps of grumbling members. They 
like to play golf but protest that they do not wish 
to spend half their time hewing their way out of 
the sand, or striving to be as accurate on the 
links as they have to be on the billiard table. 

"Another offense laid at the doors of the engi- 
neers of transcendental golf links is that they 
will not let Nature alone. Natural hazards have 
the best reason for existence of any. A ravine 
to pitch over, a fringe of swamp to carry, a bit 
of wood to skirt, a river or pond to drive across — 
such hazards no one objects to; they occur in 
the order of Nature, and excite Uttle of the wrath, 
malice, and all uncharitableness which the artifi- 
cial difficulties of man's creating so often provoke. 



52 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"About the former, the player's only thought 
is that they happen to be in his way and must 
somehow be gotten over or around, but the devo- 
tees of super-golf have little patience with what 
Nature has done. It is for them to improve on 
her. They must sweep everything clear to begin 
with, so that they may proceed to lay out their 
links like a chessboard, plotting each hole with 
the utmost care and the nicest balancing of diffi- 
culties, and penalizing every stroke that does not 
drop the ball within a yard of the spot which 
they indicate. 

"We woidd not be understood as making a 
plea for duffers' golf. The rigors of the game are 
rightly insisted upon. There is no real defense 
for those courses which 'any gentleman' can 
negotiate in comparatively low figures, no matter 
how he plays. But there are growing numbers of 
golfers, and we confess that we sometimes sym- 
pathize with them, who take a certain delight, 
even if it is a trifle shamefaced, in stealing away 
occasionally from the fearfully and wonderfully 
concatenated traps and hazards that make up 
the orthodox links, and spending an afternoon of 
' low dissipation ' on a course of another kind. 

"There, it is refreshing to find that there is 
more than one way of making a given shot, that 
there is hope for the vilest sinner while yet the 
lamp holds out to burn on the putting green, 
and that brook and terrace and bog have been 
left as Nature designed them. After a day of 
such unmanly self-indulgence, one can go back 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 53 

dutifully to wrestle with the intricacies of super- 
golf, determined to suffer and be strong." 

COMPARING GOLF— ENGLAND VERSUS AMERICA 

Great strides have been made in the United 
States. To learn what we are as linksmen, com- 
pared with older foreign golf brothers, it is some- 
times necessary to "see oursel's as ithers see us." 

On the other side of the Atlantic, where form is 
orthodox and courses natural, at least as set forth 
in the books, it would seem after all that condi- 
tions are not so completely beyond our reach. 

This word of encouragement comes from "a 
wandering Briton," who, after weeks of observa- 
tion in the States, imhesitatingly declares that the 
style of American players is far more uniform than 
at home. It is so uniform, in fact, that it is 
almost monotonous. He points to the fact that 
a dozen players will start in a big competition, 
and show almost an identical style from the tee. 
It is a good style generally, he says. The address 
to the. ball is quick and businesslike, and the 
swing is well formed with a very full follow- 
through, almost too full in many cases. 

"There seems to have been a considerable sup- 
pression of individuality, he comments, and a 
determination to proceed in the game on orthodox 
lines as set forth by the leading professionals. 
For this reason the American game conveys the 
impression of having been in a large measure 
standardized. 

"While it is a way in which many first -class 



54 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

players may be produced, and that America is 
producing them fast, it by no means indicates that 
genius is to be developed along these lines. It is 
asserted that the best American golfers are not so 
good as the British, but that they are coming on 
fast, and that with their thoroughness, keenness, 
and determination there is no telling what they 
may do. 

"So very different are the circimistances under 
which the golfers of England and America play 
the game it is doubtful if it will ever be possible 
to make any fair and exact comparison between 
the best players of the two coimtries. The per- 
formances of the leading American amateurs 
when they have visited Great Britain to take 
part in the British championships cannot be 
taken as a criterion of the quality of American 
golf, because in such circumstances the conditions 
have been as strange and as difficult to them as 
they have been for British competitors in the 
American championships. 

"The zeal and determination of the American 
players to improve their game has caused many 
a British golfer who has visited the United States 
to return home with quite a different view of the 
game here; in fact, some have openly expressed 
their admiration. 

The weak spot, in the game of the Americans, 
is the iron play, but the way they manage to pitch 
the ball and make it stop almost dead on the green 
when taking little or no turf is really wonderful. 
The climate and comparative hardness of the 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 55 

American courses may be somewhat against the 
players, but under conditions which Englishmen 
would regard as aggravating in the extreme 
Americans have cultivated a game which in many 
respects is really admirable. 

"Middle-aged golfers seem to have been a source 
of never-ending wonder to this English authority. 
The good efforts of zeal are perhaps better exem- 
plified in the middle-aged golfers who have taken 
up the game rather late in life. American golf 
clubs are full of men of fifty years of age or more, 
and many of them have not been interested in 
the royal and ancient game for more than five 
years. In Great Britain this class is also for- 
midable, but there is a world of difference between 
the comparatively new golfers of fifty of the two 
nations. It is figured that the American men of 
this class are half a dozen strokes better than their 
British brothers, and, what is more, the Americans 
are improving all the time and are bent on being 
as good players as it is possible for them to become 
at their time of life. The country swarms with 
players who are more than two thirds through an 
ordinary lifetime who have been playing only 
five or six summers and no winters — for in very 
few places in the northern United States is any 
play possible between late fall and the spring — 
and who can play a good six-handicap game in 
the British reckoning. The system of handicap- 
ping in America is such that a man at six is 
about equal to a scratch man in England. 

"The majority of Britons of middle age seem to 



S6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

become satisfied if they can make their way 
around the Hnks merely for the sake of health 
and exercise and irrespective of the score. It 
may be wisdom, but more than half of the joys 
and pleasures of golf are missed by those who 
never feel the delight at a round under their 
ordinary figures. There seems to be a complacent 
satisfaction with one's game, no matter what the 
score. 

"In America such a condition is rare. The 
middle-aged American is continually reading 
about the methods of the masters, studying them, 
and taking lessons and practicing continually, 
doing his utmost to perfect his style. The result 
is that these men are generally disappointed when 
they fail to play around a long and difficult 
course in fewer than ninety strokes, and they 
play fewer really "foozled" shots than almost 
any class of amateur players. 

These, too, are busy men, many of them with 
vast business interests. In fact, the business 
man's game is a strong feature in American busi- 
ness life. These men can tell exactly how Vardon, 
Braid, and Taylor make many of their principal 
shots, though they have never seen them. The 
aim of this class of players is thoroughness 
and proficiency, and they get twice as much en- 
joyment out of the game as the corresponding 
British player with the lackadaisical methods. " 

"The English authority does not hesitate to 
express his admiration for American golfers, 
particularly those of middle age. The young 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 57 

men are true "chips of the old block," for they 
are even more zealous and thorough than those 
of more advanced years. 

"However, the English writer cites an instance 
or two to illustrate the interest of the young-old 
men in golf. One man did not begin the game 
until he was fifty-three years old, and yet did 
not disgrace himself by any means when only 
two or three years later he played in the most 
important competition of the country. 

"A man engaged in the iron trade in Pittsburgh 
said he was sixty years of age, but was ten years 
younger than when he took up the game four 
summers before, and mentioned instances when 
he had done some of the long holes in five and 
others in foiir." 

1890 AND 1916 

■ An interesting study for reviewers and statisti- 
cians wotild be the effect of golf on American life. 
Here are a few suggestions for such a study. 

Take the district of Chicago as an example. 
Twenty-five years ago there was little or no 
country life for the people of this city. A con- 
sideration of the various forms of recreation and 
exercise at that time, the year rotmd, would have 
added interest. However, at the beginning of 
the year 191 5 there are fifty golf clubs within a 
radius of thirty-five miles from the city's busi- 
ness center. I estimate that at least twelve of 
these clubs have an average amount of three 
hundred thousand dollars each invested in their 



S8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

properties. This totals three million six hundred 
thousand dollars. 

The other thirty-eight clubs, taken together, 
have at least as much, making seven million 
dollars invested in the country life in and around 
the city of Chicago alone. The investment of 
the members in golf equipment, clothing, clubs, 
and other accessories might be conservatively 
estimated at one million dollars. When the 
large number of members in these fifty clubs is 
considered, there will be a comparatively small 
individual contribution. 

In the absence of reliable figures an estimate 
for the entire country may be made with safety, 
if not with assiu"ance and accuracy. I will name 
the sum of two hundred million dollars in all golf 
properties as the total sum invested by the 
players of the United States. It may be double 
that amoimt. With the introduction of public 
links, the values will be tremendously increased 
during the coming decade. 

The beneficial effect on the coimtry has been 
inestimable. Golf means longer life for millions 
of men and a stronger S5nnpathy for and encour- 
agement to others for exercise and recreation of 
all kinds. 

An army of caddies is employed, perhaps two 
hundred thousand. This is another rough esti- 
mate. These boys earn money, while, imder a 
non-golfing situation, they would no doubt be 
idle or at play. I think I am not overstating if 
I also claim that as a rule they become brighter 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 59 

boys, stronger youths, and better men than they 
would be otherwise. 

There is much to write on the line treated in 
this article, but I will leave some for the reviewers 
and for you, the reader. Let the subject have 
your best criticism and figures. 

THE PUSH SHOT 

Charles (Chick) Evans is an American author- 
ity on golf in many departments, but on the 
push shot he gives some particularly interesting 
advice as follows: "When I was in England and 
Scotland a few years ago I heard little about the 
shot, although I believe one writer said I played it 
as well as any amateur. Then when George Dun- 
can was here he told me that I was the only ama- 
teur on this side of the water who could play the 
push shot, and that I played it remarkably well. 
Being deeply flattered by praise from such an 
expert, I refrained from telling him that I did not 
know the shot when I saw it. At that time I 
happened to be getting exceptionally good results 
with my irons. I remember particularly that 
there was practically no run at the end of my 
flight. I may have been playing a push shot at 
that time without knowing it. 

"I glean from the British journals that the 
shot is characterized by a low, long flight on 
the same plane and dropping dead at the end. 
Now, I have ideas in the way this sort of a shot 
should be played, and it seems to me that 
both the professionals and the critic are right 



6o PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

even when they appear to contradict each other. 

It must be remembered that all iron clubs, 
even the straightest-faced long irons, are some- 
what lofted. To make the shot, one must come 
down hard and speedily upon the back of the ball 
and the lowest part of the blade strikes it above 
the center of the mass, where it remains foi* an 
infinitesimal portion of time and acquires back 
spin — then the edge of the club slides under the 
center of the mass and the lofted edge does the 
work, and the ball begins to rise. No photograph 
can register quickly enough the parts of the 
movement that simply glide into each other. I 
should judge it necessary to take up turf. In my 
opinion, the blow should be a sharp, quick snap 
struck boldly and confidently, and the follow- 
through is very short because the club head is 
stubbed when it goes into the ground. 

"Of course Mr. Vaile, the English critic, is 
right when he says the ball will not rise unless 
struck from below the center of the mass, but the 
professionals are also right in not consciously 
striving to do this. In nine times out of ten that 
would result in the old-fashioned lofted shot. 
The subconscious mind, or the slight loft of the 
club head itself, does the little lifting necessary 
to send the ball on its low flight." 

THE HOLD 

In all shots special attention must be given to 
the player's hold on his club. On this subject 
Mr. Hilton says: 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 6i 

"The iron play of the present generation of 
players is infinitely more accurate than it was 
fifteen to twenty years ago, and this added 
accuracy must be put down to the command 
which the leading players have of the half and 
three-quarter iron shots. They are probably not 
better natural players than the players of the past 
generation, but their task of being able to control 
the backward swing with an iron club has been 
made comparatively simple by the interlocked 
grip, which serves to make the task of controlling 
the upward swing of the club much more simple 
than when the hands are held in the old-fashioned 
manner, that is, separated from each other." 

FOR WOMEN BEGINNERS 

Special advice for women who intend to take 
up the game of golf is given by Edward Ray in 
the splendid English publication. Ladies' Golf: 

"The very best advice that can be given to a 
lady golfer in her novitiate is not to attempt too 
much, and to be patient and not upset at the 
apparent tardiness of success. 

"The beginner has not long to wait before the 
difficulties of golf are impressed upon her, but 
this is the time when she should take a grip of 
herself, and resolve that, come what may, she 
will master the game, 

"I firmly believe that the idea that heavy clubs 
result in longer drives being obtained, is the 
reason why so many ladies make little progress. 
The weight of their clubs should be determined 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 




The Grips of 

Harry Vardon (overlapping) Miss Cecil Leitch 

Miss G. Ravenscroft Alec Herd (overlapping) 

James Braid (overlapping) Miss May Leitch (left hand) 

Mi'ss May Hezlet {Mrs. Ross) 

Miss D. Campbell 

Miss D. Campbell (top of swing) 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 63 

by their power to swing them; it follows, there- 
fore, that if the clubs are on the heavy side, the 
user is at their mercy, for they have no control 
whatever. 

"So far as the build of the club is concerned, 
no lady should play with a club that possesses a 
stiff shaft, for to use this successfully strength of 
wrist is essential ; rather should the shaft possess a 
little suppleness, for this undoubtedly assists the 
player. 

"The novice who apparently strikes the ball 
correctly, but is annoyed because it appears such 
a poor length of stroke in comparison with the 
force applied, invariably tries to hit harder; but 
this again is fatal, for it is of no avail to press for 
distance. She should first acquire a good swing, 
and a good swing is a swing well timed, the force 
being applied at the correct moment. 

"We must start off with the knowledge that 
the lady player must rely on accuracy, to a great 
extent, to make up for her physical shortcomings, 
and this being obtained it is surprising what a 
decent length of stroke follows. 

"The majority of lady golfers find it exceedingly 
difficult to pick the ball up cleanly through the 
green; this applies to wooden club play, and the 
explanation is, perhaps, that the club is not 
traveling quickly enough. To counteract this, 
therefore, I think that she should see to it that the 
brassie has more than the average amotmt of loft. 

"To obtain length the beginner often uses her 
body: that is to say, she sways when swinging; 



64 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

but this is asking for trouble, for the result of 
swaying is invariably a missed stroke. Swing 
your arms but not your body, though in the follow- 
through your weight should go after the club. 

"When using a mashie and a bunker has to be 
negotiated, a beginner often drops the right 
shoulder, thinking that this will assist in raising 
the ball. To these I would say that the club is 
made for the purpose of lifting the ball, and the 
beginner should trust the club a little. Keep the 
body still, therefore, or the greenkeeper will view 
your progress with dismay, even when you replace 
the divot, as, of course, you naturally would. 

"But do not be afraid to take turf when the lie 
demands it ; if it is a bad one grip your club tightly 
and put all your power into the stroke. Desperate 
lies require desperate remedies, and there is no 
scope for finessing. 

"When making a tee bear in mind that, if on an 
inland course, sand costs money. To go on your 
way leaving a pyramid behind you is to draw 
attention to your lack of skill ; there is no necessity 
to build up a high tee, for you should learn to play 
the stroke from as small a tee as possible. By 
doing so, playing through the green will not appear 
such a hopeless task. 

"Learn to play all strokes in the correct manner, 
for there is great satisfaction, even should we 
foozle, in the knowledge that the attempt was 
on orthodox lines. The same thing applies to 
clubs that are supposed to prevent socketing; 
eradicate the fault that lies with you and do not 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 65 

seek outside means that, while mitigating the 
effect, leave you still with the fault; for there is 
no satisfaction in this." 

IS MR. "LINE-O'-TYPE OR TWO" RIGHT? 

Golfers should welcome criticism when it is 
seriously and sincerely given. In my experience 
there have been times when the charges which 
follow were justifiable. 

However, I doubt if the indictment should be 
allowed to stand against golfers as a whole. 
Undoubtedly a spirit of selfishness, or perhaps 
a better word is thoughtlessness, does dominate 
many. But read the charge for yourself. Whether 
the coat fits or not, it sets one thinking, and 
this occupation is not in vain when it is along 
lines of self -improvement or even for self -justifi- 
cation. "B. L. T." says: 

" Perhaps the greatest illusion about' golf is that 
it is a sociable game. Ex-President Taft is under 
this illusion, and frequently speaks of the socia- 
bility of golf. The fact is that, next to solitaire, 
golf is the most unsociable game that man has 
invented. One of many similar stories tells of 
two Scotchmen, brothers, who played together in 
perfect silence up to the twelfth hole, when one 
of them let fall a trifling remark: whereupon the 
other flew into a passion, declaring that his 
brother's gabbing had spoiled his day. An exag- 
geration, but only for artistic purposes. On all 
golf courses one sees the same twosomes and four- 
somes going out the season through. Players 



66 PRO AND CON OP GOLF 

avoid other players as they would the plague. If 
a round, even with old friends, is played sociably, 
it is at the expense of the game. Silence and 
obsequial gloom brood over the putting greens. 
A match for the president's cup is a funeral pro- 
cession. Golf a sociable game? About as socia- 
ble as a hand at Canfield in the morgue on a 
rainy afternoon." 

A PECULIAR INCIDENT 

One day at the Chicago Golf Club the ball of 
Mr. Walter Feron, one of the players in a sixsome, 
lighted in a pit, to the right of the first hole. 

The ball was lying in the side of the cop, 
close in, just where sand and cop touched. As 
he nibHcked the ball, it went high in the air. 
Then, the player keeping his position, his eyes 
almost blinded by sand after his ferocious strike, 
his right hand holding the club, and his left hand 
extended, the ball, coming down from its high 
altitude, landed squarely in his hand. 

Although he knew the rules, the others who, 
with their caddies, were standing near, were not 
sure. The player insisted that he had nothing 
to do with placing the ball where it landed. "As 
he was a moving object, he would have to carry 
it just as it was to the green." He did this, 
lifted the flag, and dropped the ball toward the 
hole. The ball struck the tin top of the hole 
and was knocked about three feet away. The 
player took three putts and tied the hole, and 
then declared that it was all for iun. He knew 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 67 

he had lost the hole when the ball touched him 
in the bunker, but as the others did not so 
understand it, he thought he would have some 
fun. Before his admissson, however, there was 
a near riot. 

SOCIAL ENDEARMENT 

A story is told of two ladies whose homes were 
in neighboring squares in the same city. One 
was very prominent socially; the other was quiet, 
useful, and, as such things go, of comparatively 
little social importance. 

They met at a summer resort, played golf 
together, and were almost constantly in one 
another's company, seemingly enjoying each 
other, the best of friends. 

Finally the sojourn of the social lady came to an 
end. As they parted at the train, she was heard 
to say: 

"Good-by, dear; I will see you here again 
next year." 

A girl may curl, 

A girl may flirt, 
A girl may have her day; 

But she can't swing a club 

Like the average man. 
Because she's not dressed that way. 



CHAPTER VI 
APPROACHING AND PUTTING 

APPROACHING and putting are the leading 
factors in playing golf. Variations of style 
in these two departments of the game make the 
difference between the novice and the expert. 
Miss Cecil Leitch, an English player, emphasizes 
the careful attention which should be given 
these sides of golf in an article from which we 
have selected several excellent suggestions: 

"The part of golf which requires the most varied 
number of shots is approaching. The approach- 
ing on different courses varies tremendously. 
St. Andrews is all run-up from a great distance, 
Walton Heath is pitch and run, Bushey and 
Hanger Hill are pitches with cut approaches. The 
first can be played with a mashie, iron, jigger or 
putter, whichever the player most fancies. 

"The pitch-and-run shot is most useful when 
there is a bunker twenty to thirty yards short of 
the green and the ground is hard. A mashie is 
the club to use. Grip it firmly and keep the 
wrists rigid, and proceed as if playing an ordinary 
run-up shot, picking up the ball clean. If turf 
is taken or if the club is held loosely, stop will be 
put on the ball and all run is lost. 

"Of all approach shots the prettiest and most 
useful is the cut shot, whether played with a 
niblick or a mashie. This shot can be used in so 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 69 

many places where difficulties of all kinds cross the 
line to the green and also at short holes. It is im- 
possible to mention all instances where this shot 
is useful : let the player master it and she will soon 
find how invaluable it is. The club is held loosely, 
the toe of club is turned well out, and the club 
drawn sharply across the ball from right to left. 
It is a quick stroke, the club going but a little way 
back and finishing about a foot from the ground. 
Played thus, the shot might be used forty or 
fifty yards from the hole. The same stroke can 
be played with any iron club, but the more pow- 
erful the club the more difficult it becomes. 

"Through necessity we discover a great many 
things at golf," continues Miss Leitch, "and it was 
through necessity that I discovered several of my 
best shots. For example, necessity taught me 
how to play what are commonly called 'wind- 
cheaters.' My home course, Silloth, is very 
windy. Often there is a regular gale, so I had 
to find some way to hit the ball so that it was 
as little affected as possible by the wind. This 
is the shot I found out and still play. It is a fuU 
wooden shot. 

"First of all, I shorten my handle and grip the 
club low down on the leather. I grip very firmly 
with both hands, stand with my feet firmly planted 
and knees stiff. Now for the swing. I take 
the club back very slowly and keep it close to 
the ground farther back than in the case of the 
ordinary swing. It is altogether a flat swing 
and shorter than my usual one. Coming down 



70 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

I take great care to keep the club under control, 
a most important thing in a high wind, and finish 
with a low follow-through, the head of the club 
finishing just above the height of the shoulder. 
This will produce a low ball which is, of course, 
what is required against a wind, and also a straight 
ball. It is the pulled or sliced ball with which 
the wind plays havoc. 

"Putting greens vary on different courses just 
as much as any other part of the course. Take, 
for instance, Hanger Hill, which has about the 
most difficult greens, while the easiest are those 
at Le Touquet. The former are keen and slop- 
ing, the latter very slow. 

"For keen greens the ball must be hit very- 
true and with a decided follow-through to get it 
to run, but on a slow green the ball can be hit 
right up to the hole with a stab shot. When the 
player has a downhill putt on a keen green it is a 
good plan to hit it off the toe of the club, as this 
puts a decided drag on the ball. For an uphill 
putt, hit it off the heel ; this has the opposite effect. ' ' 

FOURSOMES ON THE GREEN 

Bernard Darwin has given some practical con- 
sideration to thoughtless play on the putting green. 

"When suffering acutely in a four-ball match 
from a combination of my own incompetence, a 
bitter wintry wind, and the spectacle of other 
players waiting very impatiently behind, I have 
thought that a short sermon might usefully be 
preached about the system of putting in vogue in 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 71 

these contests. Everybody knows the kind of 
thing that happens. Two partners are on the 
green in the same number of strokes: A says, 
'I'll get my four first (or five or six or seven, as 
the case may be), and then you can go for your 
putt.' A does play first and perhaps succeeds in 
getting down in two putts ; then B hits at his ball 
as if his object were to drive it not into the hole, 
but over the green. Naturally at that pace he 
hits it fairly straight, but it finishes as a rule some 
five yards beyond the mark ; he hardly ever holes 
it. If either party holes a long putt it is generally 
he whose professed object was merely to lie dead. 
"Circumstances, of course, alter cases, and 
when A's ball is quite a long way from the hole, 
whereas B's is within two or three yards of it, 
it probably is good policy for A to make things 
safe first by means of his two putts. A putt of 
only eight or ten feet, when there ought to be a 
reasonably good chance of holing outright, is 
much easier for most people by the removal of 
any fear as to running out of holing distance. 
More especially is this the case when B's com- 
paratively short putt is over rough or slippery 
or sloping ground, when the best chance lies in a 
policy of 'bolting.' When, however, both balls 
are at such a distance from the hole that the 
chance of holing is comparatively small, I believe 
that it is better tactics for each partner to set 
about his approach putt independently, and 
leave the holing out to be done in its natural 
sequence. Not only are more long putts holed 



72 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

out in this way, but each partner feels that he is 
having his fair share of work and fun. 

"There is a much more aggravated case than 
the one I have taken as my instance. A is 
on the edge of the green in three, while B lies 
quite close to the hole in two, with a certainty 
of a four and a great likelihood of a three. The 
enemies, X and Y, on the other hand, have been 
plowing the sands of adversity, and are exceed- 
ingly unlikely to do better than fives. One would 
imagine that A might hold his hand for a while, 
save time, and let B have the satisfaction of 
winning the hole. Not at all, however; he must 
spend an appreciable time in tackling his long 
putt, the result of which can hardly affect the 
hole. Probably he misses it, but he may by a 
miracle hole it. In either case the hole is not 
affected, but B is considerably irritated. In 
the one case he thinks, 'Why the devil will the 
fellow waste so much time, just because he wants 
to keep his beastly score?* In the other, still 
more bitterly, 'Now I suppose he'll say that he 
won that hole, and that I never came in at all, 
though he knows quite well he could not have 
done it if it had mattered.' Golfers, of coiu'se, 
are human, and this last point of view was quite 
lately put to me — I was not his partner — by a 
good Scottish golfer, who excels in foursome play, 
and whom nobody could call a selfish player. 
When partners begin to think these hard things 
of one another it is not good for the partnership, 
and personally I believe that these infuriating 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 73 

tactics on the green supply one of the most cogent 
reasons for loathing four-ball matches. 
A FALLACY 

" 'The plan of playing for the back of the 
hole,' says N. J. L. Low, 'is all right in certain 
shots . . . but, as a rule of putting, I believe it 
to be a half-crown-destro3dng fallacy.' He goes 
on to instance Andrew Kirkaldy when at his 
very best with his wooden putter. 'From the 
edge of the green,' he says, 'the ball generally lay 
six inches from the hole, if it did not actually get 
into it. Seldom did he overrun the goal by more 
than two feet, and he holed a great ntunber of long 
shots. The impression conveyed by his play was 
that he was striving principally to gauge the exact 
distance, never driving at the back of the hole.' 

"This instance I can supplement from recol- 
lections of the best putting I ever saw, that of 
W. J. Travis in his memorable championship of 
1904. His ball always looked as if it was going 
in outright from the approach putt, and when it 
did not it stayed so very close to the hole that he 
had practically no holing out to do." 

PECKING THE BALL 

Tom Ball, too, an eminent putter, has a few 
hints for amateur golf players: 

"I seize every opportunity of practicing 
putting. If I have nothing to do in the shop for 
ten minutes, I go on to the last green and keep 
myself in touch with the art of holing-out. And 
in this connection I may remark that I do hole 



74 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

out everything; if it be only a putt of three 
inches, I play it. Such training is useful for 
stroke competitions and also for matches if you 
happen to oppose a man who agrees with the 
recommendation in the rules that players should 
not concede putts to their rivals. Winter and 
summer I follow the advice which I am here giv- 
ing; and, in the spring, when the championship 
and other big tournaments are in view, I spend 
from three to five hours a day putting; in fact, 
I devote every spare minute to the purpose. I 
am thankful to be able to say that never in my 
life have I been off my putting. 

"My own opinion is that the scheme of keeping 
the body stock still during the stroke is calculated 
to produce a general feeling of tautness which, 
I venture to declare, is one of the worst things 
imaginable for putting. It tightens all the 
muscles, with the result that the player is likely 
to snatch or stab at the ball — usually a fatal 
method. After devoting hundreds of hours to 
the study and practice of putting, I have arrived 
at the conclusion that the best way is to let the 
body go slightly forward with the club as the ball 
is struck. In that way a smooth and rhythmic 
follow-through is encouraged. And a putt struck 
with the club performing that gently-flowing 
movement is much more likely to be successful 
than one which is executed by means of a peck 
or a snatch at the ball, a method which is seen 
so often in the case of the man who keeps his 
body absolutely rigid during the stroke." 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 75 

RATIONAL GOLF 

In an interesting article in The Monitor, Mr. 
Steven Armstrong had an article under the title 
of ' ' Rational Golf. ' ' I had been watching for just 
such a comparison, and gladly give it a place in 
Pro and Con. He says: 

"In an interesting article in the Westminster 
Gazette, H. H. Hilton deals with the question of 
distance that could be accomplished with the 
old gutta-percha balls, and compares it with 
what is now covered by the latest long-driving 
balls. He says that those who hold that the new 
balls can be driven eighty to one hundred yards 
farther than the old guttie balls are allowing their 
imaginations to run away with them in their zeal 
for standardization. 

" 'Except in the driest of weather,' he goes on, 
'when the courses are like macadam roads, I do 
not think that one first-class player using a 
rubber-cored ball would succeed in keeping, on 
the average, ninety yards ahead of another first- 
class player using a gutta-percha ball; and, to 
my mind, the advantage the former would gain, 
in all conditions of weather and all conditions of 
ground, would be about sixty or sixty-five yards — 
quite far enough in all conscience, but the extra 
thirty yards they claim is inclined to make all the 
difference in the argiiment.'" 

Garden Smith says in the London Globe: 

"This is the most important pronouncement 
at the present juncture. There is no one in the 
golfing world whose opinion on this subject would 



76 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

carry greater weight than Mr. Hilton's. One 
might safely say that there is no one who is so well 
qualified as the present amateur champion. 
Throughout his career he has made a special study 
of the technicalities of the game, and he has 
besides a surprisingly good memory for what has 
happened in the past, and is the last man to allow 
his judgment to be obscured by any partisan 
feeling or other extraneous consideration. Yet 
here we have Mr. Hilton stating his opinion that 
the present rubber-cored balls can be driven, on 
the average, by first-class players, sixty to sixty- 
five yards farther than the old gutties. 

"This, of course applies only to full shots, and 
takes no account of the fact, which everybody 
admits, that the distance covered with the rubber- 
cored balls, when hit with iron clubs, is relatively 
much greater than when wood is employed. 

"This last consideration is important, because 
a hole that was a full two-shot hole with a wooden 
club in the gutta-percha days, is at best now 
reduced to a full shot and an approach, and the 
distance of that approach, which in the guttie 
days required, say, a full shot with the iron, can 
now be compassed with a half or quarter stroke. 

"But taking Mr. Hilton's estimate as it stands, 
it means that in a modem two-shot hole the 
rubber-cored player would gain an advantage, 
at Mr. Hilton's lowest estimate, of one hundred 
and twenty yards over a player who used a gutta- 
percha ball. In other words, at a two-shot hole 
designed, qua length, for the rubber-cored ball, 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 77 

the player using a rubber-cored ball would be 
on the green, or hole high, with two full shots, while 
the player using the gutta-percha ball would be 
one hundred and twenty yards short. It follows, 
if the balance of the game and its character has 
been preserved, that the modem two-shot hole 
should be one hundred and twenty yards longer 
than the old. Those who say, therefore, that 
the present long-driving balls are not ruining the 
game have to show that holes and courses have 
been lengthened to the distances required by the 
additional length obtained by the new balls. 

"Now let us take the length of the champion- 
ship courses at the time the rubber-cored balls 
came in, and compare them with their length 
to-day, and see if this additional length has 
been given them. 

"The rubber-cored balls came in in 1901, and 
in 1898, the latest date on which we can find the 
official figures, and just before the rubber-cored 
balls came in, the lengths of the championship 
cotirses were as follows: yards 

St. Andrews 6,323 

Sandwich 6,012 

Holylake 5,955 

Muirfield 5,890 

Prestwick 5,732 

The official length of these courses, according to 
the latest returns, are as follows: „,„^^ 

' YARDS 

St. Andrews 6,487 

Holylake 6,455 

Sandwich 6,143 

Muirfield 5.952 

Prestwick 5,9i8 



78 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"Lately, Prestwick, Sandwich, and Muirfield 
have been slightly lengthened, but making ample 
allowance for this, these figures show that the 
total length of the championship courses has 
only been increased by about one thousand five 
himdred yards, or, on the average, three hundred 
yards each. Allowing for the fact that there are, 
say, two short holes on each course which remain 
practically at their old lengths, this gives an 
average increase, on the length of each of the 
remaining sixteen holes on each course, of about 
nineteen yards! How this compares with the 
one hundred and twenty yards which Mr, Hilton 
gives as his estimate of the difference, at a single 
two-shot hole, between two first-class players, 
one using the rubber-cored ball and the other a 
guttie, we leave to the rubber-cored apologists 
to compute. 

"It is, at any rate, sufficiently clear that they 
have some pretty mathematics to get through 
before they can make good their assertion that 
the advocates of standardization have no grounds 
for sa^dng that the rubber-cored balls have 
altered the balance of the game and destroyed its 
character." 

HEADWORK 

There appeared a splendid article by Hugh 
Leslie Dobree in The American Golfer urging 
players to be careful in use of their clubs for 
special shots. The article in part says: 

"We constantly read in golfing and lay papers 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 79 

articles telling us exactly what we should do in 
order to become scratch players. The idea 
strikes me — opportunely perhaps — that some- 
thing might be written about the things that a 
golfer should not do. 

"It is a simple matter to give advice. The 
trouble is to get it accepted. During the winter 
months readers generally spend most of their long 
evenings thinking out for themselves the more 
advanced strokes of the game. I think that is 
the plan generally adopted when it is cold outside 
and there happens to be a clear space, and a 
poker handy to use as a substitute for a driver, or 
best of all a mashie. 

"What club would you all invariably take if 
your ball lay cuddled up in a sand-pot bimker 
adjoining the green ? I have often sat down on a 
hump near a one-shot hole, and watched players 
try to extricate themselves from such a hazard. 
The majority who found themselves in such a 
position called for the niblick without hesitation. 
Others followed Mr. Ball's theory, and used a 
mashie for such a stroke. 

"Both these clubs are excellent in their way; 
and past-masters in the art of niblick play can 
make that weapon work wonders; but have you 
ever tried a putter when there is only a twelve- 
yard shot left to do — from the bunker to the 
green ? 

"It is truly marvelous what results the novice 
can attain with this club, if he will only grip it 
tight with both hands and look intently at the 



8o PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

sand, say half an inch behind the ball. I give this 
advice exactly as it was given to me. I am sure 
that the player will be agreeably surprised when 
he discovers with what ease he can place the ball 
near the pin from what would appear to be an 
impossible - position . 

"Have you ever watched your crack golfer play 
a full two-shot hole on your course, either in a 
friendly match or in a competition? If you will 
take the first opportunity of following him across 
the 'pretty' of such a hole, you will find out what 
you should do if you wish to obtain a bogey. 

"Let us suppose that the length of the hole is 
four hundred yards. There is, of course, most 
terrible trouble if you slice or pull, but we will 
take it for granted that your tee shot has flown 
some two hundred yards directly down the 
course. Possibly your opponent is a few yards to 
the good, but lying quite close. It is for you to 
play the odd. 

"In a friendly match you have become so 
inspired with the success of your healthy tee shot 
that you take out your brassie. You foresee 
great possibilities with this club. Perhaps you 
will even place the ball near the pin. So out you 
go for ever3d;hing, only to realize — too late, of 
course — that your first effort with a brassie 
through the green is invariably pulled. You 
depart toward the whins and hack the ball back 
on to the fairway again. Luckily this only 
happens to be a friendly encounter, and does not 
matter a great deal. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 8i 

"When you find yourself in a similar position 
in a competition, there is absolutely no need to 
take a brassie for your second shot. In the first 
place it inspires confidence in your opponent. 
The odds are a million to one that you fliiff your 
shot and leave yourself a terribly powerful effort 
with your cleek to put you anywhere near the 
green in three. 

"You will notice that your adversary is content 
to play shy with iron, and leave himself with a 
tolerably simple mashie shot to make certain of a 
five. You -^dll generally find that a similar figure 
wins a hole of this description in a match-play 
competition. 

"It is the little things like this that count. 
Tearing tee shots that outdrive your opponent 
thirty yards don't win matches. Golf wotdd 
soon be at an end if they did. 

"Let us get a little closer to the green and see 
what is going to happen to us then. A little 
'chip' is what you most desire at the moment, 
and it is all Lombard Street to an orange that you 
are short with the approach. 

"Remember, it is impossible to get any work 
on the ball if it is not hit firmly. It is no use 
swinging gracefully if you do not give the ball a 
good pinch at the moment of impact. That is 
l:he secret. Bang the ball up to the hole con- 
fidently, and it will not improbably stay there, but 
do not leave everything to luck, as one is inclined 
to do. We always overrun the green on those 
occasions. 



82 PRO AND CON OP GOLF 

"Notice that your opponent takes great care 
to be past the pin. Old information truly, but 
how invaluable ! 

"Last of all, let us have a look at the green from 
a putting point of view. It is here that most of 
us throw our chances away. Don't try the full- 
drive 'act' as you putt. It is the wrong scheme 
altogether. When you have a second to spare 
just go out to the nearest green and try putting 
without any body movement at all. 

"I once saw a man win the premier prize at a 
very important open meeting, and his putting 
alone did it. He was holing out from all sorts of 
impossible places. This is how he did it: he 
would go up to the ball, take a steady glance at 
the direction, and never look up again until he 
had hit the ball by effort from the wrists alone. 
The body played no part in the game at all. It 
was motionless until the ball went in." 

THE FOURTH HOLE 

Bert Leston Taylor, a Chicago golf player and 
himiorist, uses his "B. L. T." column to give the 
beginner a few tips in golf playing, under the 
heading: "The Compleat Golfer, or the Idle 
Man's Recreation: The Fourth Hole": 

Golfator: You are to know, my honest 
Scholar, that the follow-through, concerning 
which an infinite deal of nothing is said and 
written, is like to the snark, and he that setteth 
out to compass its taking will have his trouble 
for his pains. For the follow-through is the result 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 83 

of a proper stroke, and not the cause of it; it 
hath not a separate existence, as a something to 
be sought after; therefore, I would have you take 
no thought of it. 

Scholar: Yet, Master, have I seen players 
practicing this thing with exceeding industry. 

Golfator: Marry, sir. Simple Simon were as 
well employed. But 't is the way of man to seek 
after the ends and take no thought of the means, 
and to look upon success as a something bestowed 
by heaven upon one mortal and denied to another. 
This is but vanity and vexation of spirit, as the 
Preacher saith. My good Scholar, this golf 
teacheth a man more things than one, and if you 
have any philosophy in you it shall nurture it and 
bring it to a full flower; but if you are wanting 
in philosophy you shall have as much profit in 
the beating of a carpet, for the which a multitude 
of golfers are by nature fitted. 

Scholar : Sir, your words are as apples of gold 
in pictures of silver. 

Golfator: Fairly spoken, Scholar; yet I 
mark you are impatient to be forward with your 
game, such as it is. Take, then, your iron, and 
I will counsel you in the using of it. 

Scholar: I have heard it said. Master, that 
't is easier to play with the iron than with a club 
of wood. 

Golfator: As to that there be two opin- 
ions, as usual, and you will be wise to follow 
either, for I am satisfied that they are of equal 
value. 



84 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 




ONLY THE NAME 



Lady: Why are you sobbing, my dear man ? 
Tramp : Ah, Lady, all my life I ' ve had de 
name widout de game. Me name's Goff. 



The only shots you can he dead sure 
of are those you 've had already. 



CHAPTER VII 
INDEPENDENCE IN GOLF 

IT has been my good fortune to play golf on 
the famous courses of two hemispheres, 
where from time to time I have been privileged 
to analyze the best form of both amateurs and 
professionals. 

It has come home to me that there is much in 
the wisdom of some of the best-known critics. 
However, it is not always best to become too 
firmly tied do\vn to the precedents and traditions 
of any golfing expert. 

For the sake of greater accomplishments, 
according to the individual's eccentricities, it 
were better not to accept as obligatory the hard 
and fast rule of stance, addressing the ball, or 
folio w- through . 

I think it was David R. Forgan, one of the first 
amateur champions of the Western Golf Associ- 
ation, who said: "Golf is a science." 

This has prompted that interminable query: 
"Has golf a soul?" My reply would be that 
perhaps golf is a science, in so far as it covers a 
range so wide that it could not be exhausted in 
a very prolix work, and that undoubtedly golf 
has a soul. 

It has been left to P. A. Vaile in his work. 
The Soul of Golf, to analyze admirably that soul 
of the game. 

85 



86 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Mr. Vaile is regarded, wherever the literature 
of golf has obtained a vogue, as a critic of keen 
discernment. Always good natured, he elects 
occasionally to ignore the primary traditions of 
golf, such as "Keep your eye on the ball," "Let 
your left arm control the swing," and so on. 

A well-known British reviewer who made a 
close study of Mr. Vaile's book says that the 
writer calmly strolls through the temple full of 
fetishes and idols erected by centuries of golfers, 
swinging his ax as he goes. The article go on 
to say: 

"His tone is the tone of Whistler at his best — 
'I'm not arguing with you; I'm telling you.' 
Hear him : 

" 'As a matter of fact, about seven tenths of 
the bad golf which is played is due to too much 
thinking about the stroke while the stroke is being 
played. The golf stroke in itself may be quite 
easily learned; I mean the true golf stroke and 
not the imaginary golf stroke which has been 
built up for the unfortunate golfer by those who 
write of the mystery of golf; but it is an absolute 
certainty that the time for thinking about the 
goh stroke and how it shall be played is not when 
one is playing the stroke.' 

"The italics are Mr. Vaile's — likewise the 
enunciation of a great truth. The armchair is the 
place for study, he declares, not the Hnks. 'If 
there may be said to be any mystery whatever 
about golf,' he says, 'it is that in such an ancient 
and simple game there has grown up around 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 87 

it such a confused mass of false teaching, of con- 
fused thought, and of fantastic notions. No 
game suffers from this false doctrine and imagi- 
native nonsense to the same extent as does golf. 
It is magnificently played. We have here in 
England the finest exponents of the game, both 
amateur and professional, in the world. If 
those men played golf as they tell others by their 
printed works to play it, I should have another 
story to tell about their prowess on the links.' 

"It would be unfair to the author to try to 
display on this page the wisdom he affords in 
the three hundred and fifty-six pages of his new 
book. There is room here for but one more 
quotation : 

" 'There is in England a curious idea that 
directly one acquires a scientific knowledge of a 
game one must cease to have an interest in it as 
full as he who merely plays it by guesswork. 
There can be no greater mistake than this. If 
a game is worth playing well it is worth knowing 
well, and knowing it well cannot mean loving it 
less. It is this peculiar idea which has put Eng- 
land so much in the background of the world's 
athletic field of late years. We have here much 
of the best brawn and bone in the world, but we 
must give the brain its place. Then will England 
come to her own again.' " 

IT IS ORTHODOX; IT IS NOT ORTHODOX! 

All the world loves a good winner! While 
abroad the truth of this struck home to me with 



88 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

considerable force when at every club in London 
or other British city I visited the subject of golf 
invariably brought out some new phase of gossip 
about Edward Ray, one of the recent open cham- 
pions of Great Britain. A champion Ray cer- 
tainly was and is, and the people of the old country 
realized they had a player differing from Braid, 
Vardon, Taylor, and Ball. 

Judge of my surprise to learn that the then new 
champion was considered "very unorthodox," 
and that he was a magnificent despiser of con- 
ventions. Henry Leach, in writing of Champion 
Ray, said that he thought half the golf world had 
a secret affection for the great player who did 
things in "the wrong way" and often did them 
marvelously well. Mr. Leach is well qualified to 
speak on phases of unorthodox golf, having so 
often seen it played, demonstrated, or exploited, 
as the term may be, from the insular links to the 
courses in the Chicago district where he has been 
a welcome visitor in tournament times. I find 
much of interest in his further remarks: 

"The average golfer spends most of his days in 
trying to play in the right way and succeeding 
only to a moderate extent. It cheers him to find 
those rules of system that are pressed upon him 
as being imperative broken and defied all the 
time by a man who gains the highest honors 
of the game. 

"We never have had such a heterodox man for 
open champion as Ray, and the more we know of 
him the more shall we marvel at his ways. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 89 

"The other day I came to realize that all his 
originality was not on the surface. I took an 
opportunity of examining his bag of clubs, and 
asking questions upon the different articles that 
it embraced. Never have I found an investiga- 
tion more interesting or surprising. 

"One would have guessed beforehand that 
this man who hits the ball with such tremendous 
force every time would require his driver to be 
renewed frequently, and all the more so because 
he plays with the same club through the green, 
never making use of a brassie. 

"But it is the amazing fact that he has played 
with the same wooden club from the tee and 
through the green for the last nine and a half 
years, and imless some untoward accident befall 
it that club will remain in Ray's bag until long 
after it attains its majority. 

"It is a good model, forty-two and one-half 
inches from heel to end of the shaft, scared and 
not socketed, and, according to the idea in which 
Ray very much believes, it has a thick steel face 
bolted into the head, and screwed up from behind 
just underneath the lead. 

"He has a spare driver with him as a rule, but 
it is very rarely wanted, and a peculiar wooden 
club with an absolutely square nose, this having 
once been a pear-shaped driver from the head of 
which the champion sawed away, the nose, so as to 
make it a useful club for playing from moderately 
bad lies through the green. That is its fimction 
in these days. 



90 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"His cleek, mashie, and niblick are old favorites, 
the mashie having been in his bag for nine years 
and the niblick for six. The last-named, with 
which Ray does most of his short and medium 
approaches, is more of a mashie niblick than the 
pure niblick, and it is a model that I have lately 
heard is much admired by the makers of iron 
clubs, who are eager to copy it. 

"Those are his chief tools, and now Ray is 
setting forth to tell us how he uses them. 

"To the pages of Golfing he is contributing a 
series of articles on his methods, giving advice to 
all those who would learn from him, that make 
very interesting chapters. In the opening install- 
ment he discusses driving and the best ways to 
do it. 

"He could not avoid mention of the strong 
peculiarity of his own system by which he does 
a big sway when making his swing in defiance of 
the teaching of everybody. What he tells us in 
defense and explanation is that, having swayed 
his body backward in the upward swing, he takes 
particular care to get back again and through in 
the downward swing. 

"Clearly this involves increased complication 
and difficulty in the timing of the stroke, and 
Ray's regulation of it must be marvelous in its 
accuracy. 

"He does not venture to recommend his own 
way. 

"For golfers in general, he says, this sway of 
the body is apt to upset the whole balance of the 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 91 

swing, for the difficulty lies in getting back in time ; 
'therefore,' says he, 'the steadier that the body is 
kept, and the more that the arms are used, the 
better should be the result. I know that my own 
method is strictly unorthodox, but having driven 
in this manner ever since I commenced to play 
I have naturally come to look upon it as the most 
suitable for m^^self, for we are guided in our 
judgment by results.' 

" One of the interesting points in Ray's teaching 
is his strong advocacy of the open stance in 
driving. James Braid is the champion who is 
most in favor of the square stance, in which the 
toes are almost in line with each other, and he 
has done more than any other player to make it 
popular. When Braid is champion his influence 
is such that you will often find players in general 
giving such a close and S3anpathetic attention to 
this matter as they do at no other time. 

" 'What I consider to be the chief danger of 
the open stance,' says Braid, 'is the tendency 
which undoubtedly exists to put the body into 
the stroke too soon. The body seems to want to 
get in almost as soon as the club begins the 
down swing, and when the player is a little off 
his game the body is constantly getting there 
before the club. 

" 'Therefore, unless the player is a strong man 
physically, and has a very safe and sure style of 
play, I think he will find that timing is a more 
difficult matter with the open stance than with the 
square, and also that the tendency to slice is 



92 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

increased. I have heard some people, but not 
many, say that timing is easier with the open 
stance, and I do not think there can be much 
doubt that the square stance is the better one for 
a player who is not very strong physically.' 

"It seeins to most observers, however, that 
the open stance has been fast increasing in favor 
in recept years. Harrj^ Vardon himself is its 
foremost supporter, and now we have Edward 
Ray in alliance with that party, and strongly 
advocating the open way. 

"'In connection with the correct stance,' he 
says, 'here I think there can be no two opinions, 
for the open stance has more to recommend it 
than any other. In the first place the position 
is one that enables the arms to be carried through 
after the ball is struck, this being essential; the 
body is more easily turned from the hips, and 
you never lose sight of the ball, as one comes peri- 
lously near doing if the left foot is in advance 
of the right. 

" 'Better direction is also obtained by standing 
open, and this because the player is half facing the 
hole when addressing the ball, and not, as with 
the left foot advanced, looking at the hole over 
the left shoulder.' 

"But, one should say, when Braid and others 
talk of the square stance they do not mean such 
an exaggerated advance of the left foot as to put 
it in front of the right, but one in which at most 
it is level with it and generally an inch or so 
behind." 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



93 



TRIBUTE ON LEAVING PALM BEACH 

I wish we could stay longer in this beautiful 
place. When one stops to think of it, how 
grateful one should be to have the good fortune 
to be here. And then to add to it — to play golf! 

When one looks at the white sands about Palm 
Beach, as yet untouched, it seems incredible 
that anything can grow here, yet such is the 
potency and vitality of mother earth, that with 
the kiss of the life-giving sun the sand clothes 
itself in a glory of bloom and verdure. Ivy and 
flowers climb over stumps and dead pines; and 
roses beautify old fences, as well as trail their 
beauty up to and around the homes of wealth. 

The air is filled with the fragrance of land 
and sea, and one feels that the Scripture has 
been fulfilled, that "the desert shall blossom 
as the rose, and the barren plains bear fruit." 




Another kick on early morning racket 



94 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

INDIVroUALITY 

"That was a pretty good score you made 

to-day." 

' ' Yes, it was n't bad. Curiously enough, there 's 
a reason for it. Yesterday I followed that match 
in which Brady and McDonald and — er what's 
his name — Maiden, were playing. Terrific balls 
they all hit. But here's what impressed me. 
They all did it in different ways ! Which set me 
thinking. Brady did not attempt to copy 
McDonald's style, as most of us amateurs are 
prone to do when the other fellow gets off a 
screamer; nor were McDonald or Maiden con- 
cerned about the methods of the other man. 

"Now, ordinarily, I can hit off a fairly decent 
tee shot in my own way, but the temptation to 
imitate the first man I meet who can outdrive me 
is usually irresistible. To-day I didn't do it!" 

ENGLISH DEFINITION OF AN AMATEUR GOLFER 

An amateur is one who, after attaining the age 
of sixteen years, has 

(a) Never carried clubs for hire. 

(6) Never received any consideration, directly 
or indirectly, for playing or for teaching the game. 

(c) Never played for a money prize in any 
competition. 

No amateur may, without forfeiting his status, 
receive directly or indirectly from the promoter 
of any match or tournament any consideration 
for playing in such match or tournament. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 95 

PECULIAR GOLFERS 

"Great golfers are not afraid of being thought 
'pectiliar.' The secret of their success, as regards 
sudden choice of clubs, lies in their habit of doing 
the right thing at the right moment. Their 
decision is prompt and absolute. Golf is a game 
of thought, determination, and will power, as 
well as a trial of strength skillfully applied, and 
only he who can think rightly and act bravely 
can obtain the full enjo5rment which the infinite 
variety of the game affords." 

BRAINS 

Brains are the chief asset in any game, or, for 
that matter, in all of life's activities. Golf links, 
clubs, balls, are things. Arms, wrists, eyes, body, 
strength, contain no ideas. They are accessories, 
which one can depend on to help toward successful 
performance, only, however, by using just one 
absolute essential — brains. 

The "thought factory" is the foundation of all 
achievement. It is the best club in the bag. It 
is more than the whole set of clubs, — balls and 
caddie thrown in. The first requisite in any 
game, therefore, is brains. 



When a golfer has tact, no one notices it; 
when he lacks tact, every one notices it. 



CHAPTER VIII 
CLEVERNESS ON THE LINKS 

HOW often has the visitor at a club during a 
particularly important tournament heard 
the expression, "It pays to be clever in a golf 
match ' ' ? Immediately the query suggests itself to 
the student of golf: "How smart should one be?" 
Is there a clearly defined boundary between the 
legal advantage to be gained by a quick-working 
brain and the unsportsmanlike work that might 
be termed "sharp practice"? There are many 
who would claim every penalty provided for in 
the rules, and think it nothing strange if they 
were severely criticized. Others — and their 
number has been legion in innumerable tourna- 
ments — would risk disqualification under the St. 
Andrews or the United States Golf Association 
rules by waiving a penalty rather than owe their 
victories to the "tough luck" of their opponents. 
Sentiment sometimes has been the biggest hazard 
that a young golfer has had to overcome in 
administering a defeat to an opponent who, 
perhaps, might be three bisques behind him as 
a golfer. It reminds me of the story told of a 
critical stage in a keen team match foursome 
when a caddie picked up the ball on the green 
under the impression that a half had been con- 
ceded. One of the opponents promptly cried, 
"Our hole!" 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 97 

"A half," his partner quietly announced; 
"we are not playing for gold cups." 

Much must depend, of course, on the nature of 
the game. A sporting spirit may still be displayed 
in a friendly match, while it might be out of place 
in a medal round, where all are affected, or in 
professional play, where a man's livelihood is at 
stake. At a critical moment of a big match years 
ago one of the players teed up his opponent's ball, 
which had found an impossible lie off a penalty 
drop. That was a noble deed. Too often, 
however, it is the aggrieved party who appeals for 
mercy by some such plaint as "What can I do 
here?" when the ball is in a difficult position. 
Others search hastily through local rules in the 
hope of escaping a penalty. There is some very 
hard luck to be experienced in golf, but the man 
with the true temperament will set himself to 
overcome it without complaint. The grumbler 
is not the only man whose ball settles down in a 
heel mark, or moves as he is addressing it, or 
rebounds from a bank on to his foot, or rolls off 
the tee as he plays. It is braver to suffer in 
silence than loudly to solicit sympathy from those 
who have enough troubles of their own. 

Gerald Batchelor in Golf Illustrated advises 
players not to be hypercritical of their opponents. 

"Some will maintain that 'a rule's a rule' 
and stubbornly stick out for their rights," he 
says, and continues: 

"It is obvious that there are certain penalties 
which need not be rigidly enforced in ordinary 



98 PRO AND CON OP GOLF 

match play, just as there are certain things which 
are plainly unlawful, although not mentioned in 
the rules. No penalty is prescribed for the man 
who suddenly jumps forward while his opponent 
is at the top of his swing and shouts 'Boo!' at 
him, for no one would seriously think of doing 
such a thing. But there are other methods more 
subtle, though almost as effective, of putting a 
man off his game. One may persist in little acts 
that plainly irritate him. One may drop the bag, 
quite accidentally of course, as he is putting, or 
tell him that he 'can't possibly miss that short 
putt for the match,' or walk or talk him off his 
game. 

"Then there is the still more shady trick of 
trjdng on the game of bluff. A was practically 
dead on the last green and B had a long put to 
halve the match. He just failed to go down, 
but laid a dead stimy, whereupon A calmly 
knocked B's ball away, holed his own, and claimed 
a halved match. This verges on actual cheating. 

"Finally we come to the cases in which clever- 
ness may be legitimately employed in a man's 
favor. It is granted that one should by no 
means hinder the actions of an opponent, but one 
need not, on the other hand, do anything to 
assist him. Suppose we come to a hole where 
the distance or wind influence is doubtful and the 
opponent has the honor. The careful player who 
has made up his mind will not take the chosen 
club from the bag luitil the other has played. 
Golfers' abilities and caprices vary so much that 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 99 

it is risky to base one's decisions on another's 
choice of club. If the enemy sees us reach the 
green with a spared spoon we are not responsible 
for his being far over with a full brassie. There 
are many means apart from skill with his clubs 
by which a player may improve his chances and 
reduce his handicap. He should be alert to 
calculate distances, wind force, the pace of the 
greens, the consistency of bunker sand, and so 
on. It certainly pays to be clever in the obser- 
vation of details. 

"One of the most insufferable nuisances of 
the links is the opponent who is always fidgeting 
about the score, yours and his own. The most 
trying specimen of this type is the man who, 
just as you are taking your stance for a tricky 
approach or putt, shouts out, 'How many have 
you played?' And on being told, replies, 'You 
play the odd now.' It is all very well now and 
again, but when it happens at every hole murder- 
ous thoughts enter your mind. Yet the rules of 
goH committee of St. Andrews proposes that to 
Rule 4 should be added these words: 

" 'A player is entitled at any time during the 
play of a hole to ascertain from his opponent the 
number of strokes that the latter has played; if 
the opponent gives wrong information as to the 
number of strokes he has played he shall lose 
the hole, luiless he corrects his mistake before the 
player has played another stroke.' Such an ad- 
dition is entirely unnecessary and may be very 
mischievous. Good players very rarely find it 



loo PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

necessary to say anything at all to each other 
about the score, and when it is needful a quiet 
question is sufficient. In its present form this 
addition to the rules seems to be quite out of 
harmony with the spirit of the game." 

HONESTY VERSUS THE SCORE 

Referring to the gentleman who turned in a 
card of 317 at the Biarritz, golf competition, we 
have only this to say: 

"While feeling that we maintain at least an 
average standard of honesty, there are times 
when one's pride and self-respect must be main- 
tained at all costs. 

"Hence, when we go beyond 312 for eighteen 
holes, we follow an iron rule which requests the 
caddie to tiun his head until certain corrections 
can be made upon the card. 

"As between being dishonest and being branded 
as a 317 stroke golfer, we shamelessly confess to 
one sudden, volcanic, and irremediable choice. 
It may not be the 'best policy,' but what is more 
to the point, it is the only tenable one for a golfer 
. who desires further privileges of the course." 

NOT EVEN HIS SECOND 

"A club professional had just left his shop and, 
approaching the first tee, he saw a player taking 
stance three feet in front of the plate, and about 
to make a stroke. 

"The professional said: 'Excuse me, sir, I hope 
you won't be offended — but you know the rules 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF loi 

say that the first stroke must be taken from 
behind the plates.' 

" 'Never mind, say nothing about it; this is my 
third stroke.' " 

LINKS WITH GOOD ACOUSTICS 

Four men were playing golf on a course where 
the hazard on the ninth hole was a deep ravine. 

They drove off. Three went into the ravine 
and one managed to get his ball over. The 
three who had dropped into the ravine walked up 
to have a look. Two of them decided not to try 
to play their balls out and gave up the hole. 
The third said he would go down and play out 
his ball. He disappeared into the deep crevasse. 
Presently his ball came bobbing out, and after 
a time he climbed up. 

"How many strokes?" asked one of his oppo- 
nents. 

"Three." 

"But I heard six." 

"Three of them were echoes!" 

SHOULD HE DIE OR BE INCARCERATED? 

The man that asks his opponent, just as the 
latter is about to approach or putt: "How 
many have you had, Jim?" 

The man that yells across the course, regard- 
less of the play or location of the other seven 
golfers in both groups: 

"How is your game going, Ed?" 



102 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

The man that seizes your club, after you have 
dubbed, and says: "Let me show you how that 
shot should be made, Harry." 

The man that habitually keeps you waiting at 
the first tee .fifteen minutes after all others are 
ready to play. 

The man that takes two minutes to study, 
practice, and secure his stance before making his 
shot. If the shot is dubbed, give him full penalty 
on the spot. 

The man that, on beginning the game, asks 
you to give him one up because he was one down 
in the last game. Ditto, same habit on com- 
mencing second nine. 



No player is so good that trouble 
won't sooner or later overtake him. 



CHAPTER IX 
CONCENTRATION 

CONCENTRATION of the mind on the ball 
or on the play is a recognized truism of all 
golf. Diverting incidents during tournaments 
have lost many a match for superior players. 
The following article by Laurance Woodhouse 
throws a light on the quality of concentration of 
one of the best players of our times : 

"Nothing has caused greater pleasure to the 
golf-loving public than the wonderful success of 
J. H. Taylor, the ex-open champion, at the 
German open championship at Baden Baden. 
Taylor tied with Edward Ray, the open cham- 
pion, for first place, and when the tie was 
played off over the old nine-hole course Taylor 
accomplished the extraordinary feat of holing 
out the nine holes in twenty-eight strokes, giving 
him an average of one over three's. 

"Ray might reasonably have expected to win, 
seeing that he did the round in thirty-three — an 
average of three under four's — but Taylor's 
amazing effort quite took the wind out of his 
sails and he had to be content with second place. 
Taylor's card read: 

23233453 3—28. 

"The famous Mid-Surrey professional attributes 
this wonderful round to 'sustained concentra- 
tion.' He says that from his first tee shot to 

8 103 



104 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

his final putt he saw almost to an inch where 
he wanted to place the ball and felt confident 
that he would do so. His confidence was justified 
all through the round. Curiously enough, just 
before setting out for Baden Baden he did the 
first nine holes on the Mid-Surrey ladies' course 
in twenty-eight and the eighteen holes (s,ooo 
yards) in sixty. His best round, however, he 
considers to be his sixty-eight at Sandwich in 
1904, when Jack White, of Sunningdale, won the 
championship from him by one stroke. In a 
championship meeting at Muirfield, too, he did 
the last nine holes in thirty-one when Braid won 
the championship there. 

"Concentration is Taylor's motto. He argues 
that if you let your attention relax even for a 
second during a round you cannot come back 
on to your game again. He has a horror of being 
spoken to during an important match. In fact, 
he says he does not hear what people say, so intent 
is he on the game and the stroke about to be 
made. In 1909, when he won the championship 
at Deal, Taylor's brother walked round with 
him during the last round and prevented any one 
speaking to him and the photographers from 
clicking their cameras at him while he made his 
strokes. 

"His attention was first called to the necessity 
for absolute concentration by an article written 
by Mr. C. B. Fry many years ago. In this article 
Mr. Fry related how he lost a hundred yards' 
sprint on one occasion by letting his thoughts 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 105 

wander from the tape to which he was running. 
Just for a second he wondered what his opponents 
were doing. This lapse cost him the race, for, 
as his thoughts wandered, he insensibly slackened 
speed and was passed and lost the race. Taylor 
was so impressed by this article that he has 
studied concentration ever since. 

"Taylor argues, too, that when you are playing 
at your very best you are in almost a mesmerized 
state. He thinks that the club is no longer an 
implement for hitting the ball but becomes al- 
most part of you, and that from your brain to 
the club head you are all one, the club, the brain, 
and every nerve and muscle being in absolute 
S5mipathy. 

" 'Concentration is the great secret of how to 
win championships and to do record rounds,' 
he concluded." 

HOW TO KEEP THE EYE ON THE BALL 

Mr. Taylor's leading axiom has been made 
plainer and easier for beginners to follow by 
Arnold Houltain's article on "The Secret of Golf." 
Although the article in question had many readers 
when in magazine form, I deem it too good to 
•entirely overlook in a work of this kind. I only 
regret that I may not give my readers the entire 
article. 

I recommend a careful reading of all articles 
by this excellent writer, who handles his subjects 
in a masterly way. 



io6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Mr. Houltain quotes the following from Mr. 
Taylor's big book on golf : " To succeed in keeping 
the eye unswervingly on the ball is the one and 
only secret in golf," and then continues: 

''How can we keep our eye on the ball? And 
why must we keep our eye on the ball? Whence 
arises the necessity? Wherein consists the pecu- 
liar efficacy of fixing the gaze on that humble 
little sphere at our feet — or at its top — or at 
its back — or at the turf behind, as the case may 
be? What happens if we do look? What 
happens if we do not look? These be important 
problems. 

"I attempt here a brief analysis (i) of the 
'How\ and (2) of the 'Why.' 

"This little puzzle, how to keep one's eye on 
the ball, may be said to possess a little psychology 
all its own. We 'perceive' an object, say the 
psychologists, when not only 'our attention is 
drawn' to that object, but when 'all the other 
impressions that are exciting sensations at the 
same moment fall into the field of inattention' ; in 
plain words, when we are oblivious of everything 
but the thing perceived. It is this inattention 
or oblivion that the golfer has most carefully 
to practice. If, during that infinitesimal period 
of time wliich elapses between the beginning of 
the upward swing of the club and its impact with 
the ball, the golfer allows any one single sensation, 
or idea, to divert his attention — consciously or 
unconsciously — from the little roimd image on 
his retina, he does not properly 'perceive' that 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 107 

ball; and of coiirse, by consequence, does not 
properly hit it. 

"There is one simple anatomical reason for 
this inability to see your ball when you are think- 
ing of something else instead of looking. Every- 
body has heard the phrase 'a vacant stare.' 
When one's thoughts are absorbed in something 
other than the object looked at, the eyes lose 
their convergence; that is to say, instead of the 
two eyeballs being turned inward and focused on 
the thing, they look straight outward into space; 
with the result, of course, that the thing looked 
at is seen indistinctly, 'We must will to see,' says 
the great psychologist Hoffding, without the 
remotest cognizance of the extreme applicability 
of this maxim to the game of golf, — and without 
apparently, we may add, the remotest cognizance 
of the extreme corroboration which the game of 
golf gives to this maxim, 'We must will to see, 
in order to see aright.' As a matter of fact, golf 
is the most rigid tester of will power in the world. 
It is this that makes it so interesting. It is this 
that makes it so important. It is this that makes 
it so educative, so edifying. For it does edify: 
that is, build up; it builds up character, because 
it strengthens will power; for will power is the 
foundation of character. 

"The whole thing seems so childishly simple; 
yet the achievement of that whole thing is so 
abominably difficult. No wonder we make 



io8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

mistakes in golf. We make mistakes in every 
department of life : we bet on the wrong horse, or 
the wrong cards; we buy the wrong stock; we back 
the wrong friend; we marry the wrong wife. 
Is it any wonder we make the wrong stroke? 
And golf is more exacting than racing, cards, 
speculation, or matrimony. Golf gives no mar- 
gin: either you win or you fail. You cannot 
hedge; you cannot bluff; you cannot give a stop- 
order; you cannot jilt. One chance is given you, 
and you hit or miss. There is nothing more rigid 
in life. And it is just this ultra and extreme 
rigidity that makes golf so intensely interesting. 

"What, then, is this thing called 'attention,'. 
a thing to which whole big books have been 
devoted? It is very difficult to find anjnvhere a 
clear, precise, coherent, and adequate definition. 
'Attention,' says Mr. Pillsbury, 'means largely 
that some one element of consciousness is picked 
out from the others, and given an advantage over 
them.' How many elements are there? Who 
or what picks one out ? And what sort of advan- 
tage is bestowed upon this one? In its way, we 
might say that attention was the concentration 
of the whole mind upon the particular thing 
that one wishes to do. But here again, what is 
the 'whole mind'? and if there are several partic- 
ular things that one wishes to do, all at one and 
the same time, how and on which is that whole 
mind to be concentrated? Who or what is it 
that 'wishes' to do this, that, or the other; and 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 109 

how does this 'who' or 'what' differ from the 
'whole mind'? Is not my 'whole mind' just 
mef Why cannot I do what I wish to do? How 
is it that I cannot compel myself to keep my head 
steady, to keep my eye on my ball, to follow 
through? 

"But if only one thing can be 'attended' to at 
a time, what precisely ought we to attend to at the 
moment of impact of club with ball? Well, if 
you ask me, I say, ike image of the hall. I firmly 
believe that what is necessary is the external, not 
the internal, the sensorial, not the ideational, 
form of attention. I firmly believe that if you 
can keep your eye on the ball — keep it there, 
mind you — and 'attend' to that one thing alone 
at the moment that you hit, the hit will 'coom 
aff,' as a Scotchman said to me once. Indeed, a 
noted psychologist bears me out in this: ' "Keep 
your eye on the ball" in golf,' says Mr. Pillsbtuy, 
'is a familiar statement of the fact that the move- 
ment of the arms is controlled immediately by 
attention to some object in the field of vision. 
There is little or no thought of the movements to 
be made, or of anything else except the place 
upon which the blow is to be delivered.' All 
of which merely means that the attention to ' the 
movements to be made' must be finished and 
done with before the attention is fixed upon ' the 
place upon which the blow is to be delivered.' 

"And now to sum up on this problem of atten- 
tion. I suspect that to concentrate the attention 



no PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

is a natural gift. Some men can do it; some men 
cannot. If you cannot be utterly absorbed in 
-what you are doing, be it only looking at your 
ball — well, I can only recommend you to go out 
day after day — day after day — and attend to 
nothing else whatsoever but the look at yotir ball. 
When you have persuaded some cerebral center 
to do that automatically," you can begin to train 
other centers to do other things. 

"But apart from all these anatomical, physio- 
logical, and psychological theories, I have some- 
times thought that there are two simple and 
especial reasons for this difficulty of keeping one's 
eye on the ball; first, because there is nothing to 
stimulate the attention; secondly, because one has 
to attend so long. In cricket, tennis, racquets, 
the stimulus is extreme: by consequence your 
eye follows the ball like a hawk. In billiards 
there is no stimulus, but you never or rarely take 
your eye off your ball in billiards. Why? I 
think because (i) the ball is much nearer to your 
eye, and therefore the image is clearer and the 
stimulus stronger; and (2) because the period of 
time reqtdsite for the stroke is so short. In golf 
the stimulus is weaker and the period longer. 
In all probability the intensity of the attention 
very soon tires the delicate cerebral ceUs so 
attending. I imagine these cells to be in a state 
of tremendous tension, and that this tremendous 
tension can be kept up for only a very short 
period of time. No doubt the tension depends 
upon the blood supply. Well, there are about 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF m 

seventy-two ptilsebeats in the minute. One 
fraction of a second, therefore, may alter the 
character and the intensity of the tension. 

"And this leads to yet another point. My 
friend Mr. Kenyon-Stow, in an interesting con- 
versation I had with him, averred (and I partly 
agree with him) that the whole and sole virtue of 
the foUow-through depends upon the fact that 
that follow-through is the result of keeping your 
eye on the ball. If you donH keep yoiir eye on 
the ball, your stroke is cut short the moment you 
take your eye off, and you do not follow-through; 
if you do keep your eye on the ball, your stroke is 
not cut short and you do follow-through. I think 
that this is incontestable, though I very much 
doubt whether that immortal genius who crystal- 
lized this diamantine axiom into a sexiverbal 
maxim qmte understood what portentous though 
elemental truths he was consolidating into a 
single sentence. 

"Mr. Kenyon-Stow's theory seems to throw a 
light and to be an advance upon the theory of 
Braid. Braid thinks the optic nerve works faster 
than the arms, and that therefore the eyes look 
up before the arms have finished their business. 
The fact probably is that if the mind is really 
attending to the retinal image of the ball, the 
orders issued to the motor centers of the arms 
will continue just so long as the image of the 
ball upon the retina continues; and as the retinal 
image remains for about one fortieth of a second 



112 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

after the object has departed, the stroke is contin- 
ued for that one fortieth of a second, and the 
follow-through is established. This, at all events, 
is indisputable: any photograph showing a good 
follow-through shows the player looking at the 
spot where the ball was, long after the ball has 
left it. 

"It was left to Mr. Walter J. Travis to hit the 
nail of the 'Why' on the head. 'The time- 
honored injunction laid down by all writers and 
teachers to 'keep your eye on the ball' — which 
eye, by the way? — would be more aptly expressed 
by insisting upon the head being kept absolutely 
still and in the same position as in the address until 
the ball is struck — or even a moment after .... 
' If the head is kept in the same position through- 
out the swing, the player may even go so far as 
to absolutely shut his eyes and be reasonably 
certain of getting the baU well away, provided no 
jerk is introduced.' So says Mr. Travis. Mrs. 
Gordon Robertson, golf professional at Princes' 
Ladies' Golf Club, Mitcham, England, goes, 
indeed, further still : ' Before a beginner attempts 
to handle her clubs there is one thing which she 
is always told, and that is, " Keep yoiu" eye on the 
ball." In the course of my teaching I have 
noticed something which, in my opinion, is even 
still more important. ... It is this: "Keep 
your head still." By doing this it is impossible 
to take your eye off the ball.' (But Mrs. Gordon 
Robertson will permit me to point out that one 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 113 

could, by rolling the. eyeballs, keep the eyes on 
the ball, yet move the head.) 

"Almost every movement of otir bodies proves 
that the muscles are obedient to the eyes, cannot 
act properly imless guided by the eyes. Why, 
at this very moment I may be said to have 
taken my stance and be 'addressing' my ink pot. 
(I address it for hours every day.) I know 
exactly where it is, and I am keeping my head 
steady. Yet every time I want ink I have to 
look at that ink pot. Could one even light a 
pipe blindfolded? 

"It is a pity that so many literary elucidators 
and explicators of the game of golf devote so many 
pages to the subsidiary circumstances connected 
with the game. They descant, most learnedly 
and delightftdly I admit, on how you should stand 
and how you should strike, on the kind of club 
you should use and on the kind you should not. 
I wonder if they would pardon me if I said that, 
as a matter of simple fact, if one attended to the 
game (with all that that means) , one could stand 
and strike as one chose, and almost with any 
kind of club. If one never, never transgressed 
any of the primary rules of golf, almost one could 
play with a pole ax! 

"What a piece of work is man! And how golf 
intensifies our amazement at that piece of work! 
Extraordinary, indeed, it is to think that a 



114 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

nattiral gift, an intellectual trait, a moral attri- 
bute, a mental habit, an inherited temperament 
will determine the nature of the game you play. 
In a sense, of coiu-se, a man's character will always 
determine the manner in which he will play any 
game; or, to put it conversely, the way a man plays 
any game will always be an index to his character. 
Well, is there any game so indicative of character 
as is golf? At bottom, perhaps, the secret of golf 
lies somewhere imbedded in character." 



When a golfer makes a fool of himself by 

breaking or throwing down a club, he is 

terribly surprised. He can't understand 

why the rest of the world isn't. 



CHAPTER X 
AMERICAN CONTRIBUTION TO GOLF 

RECOGNITION of the law of concentration 
in the playing of golf seems to be distinctly 
an American contribution to the game. Players 
abroad have taken much interest in Americans' 
play on that account. "A Wandering Player" 
thus discusses the peculiar features of play by 
Americans visiting at St. Andrews and elsewhere 
in the British Isles, taking occasion at the same 
time to criticize in an adverse way some other 
phases of American style: 

"A problem of deep importance to the future 
of this game has arisen, and the yoimg American 
school has forced it to the front. It is a question 
of practice swings, of waiting for inspiration, and 
of concentration. These three points are special- 
ties with several of the leading young players of 
the United States, and in the course of the visit 
with which they have favored us we have had an 
ample opportunity of studying their methods and 
the effects thereof. We are at the same time 
impressed and afraid. 

"I was- probably the first to draw attention to 
the manner in which Heinrich Schmidt was win- 
ning his matches in the amateur championship at 
St. Andrews, and at that time I saw no danger in 
the example but only good in it, and urged that 
there was a moral plain for British golfers to 

"5 



ii6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

abandon the slapdash, thoughtless methods of 
which they are so often guilty, to be more careful, 
and to concentrate thoroughly. 

" It is the plain fact that the majority could do 
far better with their game if they did not waste so 
much of it by carelessness, thoughtlessness, and 
a sort of distraction which allows their thoughts to 
wander to other things than the stroke in hand, 
and sometimes by their conversation, too. When 
a man has played a stroke he has quite sufficient 
to occupy his mind for the next minute or two in 
considering how he shall play the next one and 
the many features of the case that will be presented 
to him. 

"Any serious interruption in this continuous 
thought breaks the spell that is upon the player 
and handicaps him seriously. The other day I 
was discussing the matter with Mr, E. A. Lassen, 
who had been a severe sufferer from the excessively 
slow methods of one of the Americans, and he 
stated the case exactly when he said that with so 
much hesitation and waiting * it was like beginning 
a new match at every shot,' and it is just the same 
way with the people who do not think contin- 
uously and concentrate ; they are beginning a new 
game at every shot, and it ends with that shot and 
is a poor game altogether. It is not golf. Harry 
Vardon has said that 'the best golf is played in 
silence,' and he is right. Taylor, the champion 
again, is all for concentration. Nobody con- 
centrates more than he does. All the rest of the 
world is dead when he is at the game, and he 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 117 

attributes the best of his success to this habit of 
intense concentration. 

"To this extent the methods of the young 
Americans are cleariy justified, and we have 
something to learn from them in the care they 
take over their game and the very Httle of their 
quaHty that they waste. One might very well put 
it that of the game possessed by the Americans of 
the Schmidt and Steams pattern about ninety-five 
per cent becomes effective, and that of the game 
possessed by the average amateur in this country 
(England) not more than sixty-five per cent be- 
comes effective, which means that when players of 
the two kinds of approximate equality as regards 
skill at strokes meet each other the American will 
win easily. He is not the better golfer, but he 
makes the most of his game. 

"Another question, however, arises, and that is 
whether the Americans are not overdoing it. 
At La Boulie, when the French amateur cham- 
pionship was being played for, three hours and 
ten minutes were taken over a match that had a 
clear green in front of it all the way, through the 
slowness of the American player. 

"At La Boulie Mr. Hilton was waiting until he 
was weary at every stroke played by his opponent, 
and undoubtedly he was 'put off' and could not 
play his proper game. Others siiffered in the 
same way. These slow players use up the time 
in three ways: first by deep thought, secondly 
by an exhaustive course of prospecting of the land 
in front when the short game is being played. 



ii8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

and thirdly by a series of practice swings done 
most meditatively. They leave nothing whatever 
to chance. 

"Now I believe in the practice swing — just one 
or at most two. A man may be an experienced 
golfer, and he may have played a certain stroke 
nearly a million times before, but golf is essentially 
a game of fears and doubts, and apart from just 
setting the right muscles in a state of complete 
preparation for the task in hand a practice swing 
gives one a little confidence. But the Americans 
go further than this, and it is questionable whether 
they are wise. For one thing, those delicate 
muscles and the nervous system that are con- 
cerned with the stroke in hand are easily tired, 
and if the shot is a long one needing power the 
odds are against its being done so well after four 
practice swings as after one. Show me the man 
who can drive his best and straightest after four 
practice swings on the tee. 

"Then there is the hesitation and doubt that 
are induced. I believe that in most cases these 
players are really waiting for an inspiration. 
But it does not always seem to be responsive, and 
they wait too long. A moment must come when 
they are as ready for the shot as ever they will 
be in their lives; if they let it pass nothing but 
doubts and hesitations can follow, and that is 
the danger to the player of excessive slowness. 
He begins to fear his fate too much. And also 
one round of golf played like this makes a fearful 
mental strain. We have noticed this season 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 119 

that the men who win their morning matches by 
such methods look very tired and lose easily in 
the afternoon. 

"Then, if three hours or more were taken over 
every game, golf as we have it now would become 
impossible. Only one round a day would be 
practicable, it would be a wearying thing, and the 
game would not be the same. There is no 
question of imposing time limits; it could not be 
done. Players must simply be given to under- 
stand that too much slowness is very bad form. 

"But this is not to say that these Americans 
with their practice swings and their thought and 
concentration are by any means wholly wrong. 
They have simply gone to an extreme which I 
think is bad for them as well as for other people. 
A middle course between their methods and ours 
is a sure way for the improvement of the game of 
many average British golfers." 

WHAT KIND OF A GAME DO YOU PLAY? 

Golf players may read with interest the fol- 
lowing editorial from a Chicago newspaper. It 
shows a universal need of concentration. Al- 
though the game referred to is the game of life, 
the editorial has direct reference to all life that 
one may touch. If one plays goh, that is a part 
of one's life. All men are better for some pleasur- 
able recreation and exercise. 

The editorial might be headed "Keep your 
mind on the one important thing." 

" You don't need the editorial and ought not to 



I20 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

waste time reading it if you are qtiite sure that the 
best that is in you is being used every hour, and 
used to give you the best chance possible. 

"Among a million men there may be one or 
two who really play the game of life as a good 
player plays the game of chess. The one or two 
men in a million do not need to talk or think about 
the importance of concentration — but all the 
rest of us do need to realize what intense con- 
centration might mean for us. 

"There isn't a man who doesn't want some- 
thing that he does n't possess. There is n't 
one who is n't planning in a more or less aimless 
way to do something, to get something, to be 
something. And there really is not one who 
could not succeed fairly well, at least, if he could 
only keep his mind on real things and off of other 
things. 

"Have you ever seen two men play chess, a 
good player and a bad player? The bad player 
begins apologizing for himself before the thing 
starts, apologizes all the way through, and loses 
at the end, even though the queen or other pieces 
be given to him in advance. 

"The good player sits down, looks good-natur- 
edly at his opponent, watches his first move, 
plans the thing out, wins smilingly and easily, but 
his mind has been on the game. 

"Life is a game. Every one of us must play 
it whether he wants to or not. And every one 
plays the game with the same old partner — Time. 

"At life's table, opposite you, sits Time with 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 121 

his scythe, and at his elbow the stakes — Success. 

"Anything that takes your mind off the game 
gives Time the advantage. That is to say, 
anything that does not at the same time add to 
your power of work and thought. 

"Time plays against us all, and he nearly 
always wins. MilHons of men and women in 
the world are saying every day, ' If I were younger 
I would do this,' or 'I would do that.' Every 
man thinks of what he would do if he had to live 
over again the hours during which he let Time 
win while he lost. 

"There is no use going back over the moves 
that have been made foolishly. The game is 
still on, and it is never too late to win it if you 
will make up your mind, concentrate your mind, 
and brush aside interruptions. 

"Time is a good-nattired old man; he plays 
fairly and leniently. But he is relentless in his 
steady onward pace; he never gives you back 
the day that you have given him for nothing. 
That is one day off the board. But you can win 
and beat him in the days that remain, if you will. 

"Lectures on concentration are needed by 
young men especially. For their temptations are 
the most numerous. Much intelligence is used up 
trjdng to get their minds away from the real work. 

"Foolish fashion makes them waste time on 
their clothes, their hats, their looks, when those 
looks amount to nothing. The man of brains 
should simply make up his mind to look clean, 
to show self-respect; nothing else matters. 



122 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"The hard thing for young men and others to 
remember is that their work is their real occupa- 
tion. Take the average young man playing a 
game of cards, of baseball, of golf, or any other 
mere amusement. If you should try at that time 
to interest -him in some outside thing, some new 
kind of a hat band, some new color for the cra- 
vat, he would say to you. 'Don't bother me; I 
am busy now. You will make me lose the game.' 

' ' How many know enough to say the same thing 
when they are playing life's real game, which is 
the game of work? 

"Many young men act like a man who has 
forgotten the road, or like a drunken man stagger- 
ing to the right and to the left, falling down, 
getting up, and finally landing in jail instead of 
landing at home. 

"The road before every man is perfectly clear, 
and there is only one way of getting over that 
road, which is to walk straight ahead to the efid of it. 

"Suppose a man were locked up in jail and had 
to make his way out. What would you think of 
him if one day he started to bore a hole in one 
spot and the next day started a hole in another 
spot, and kept on all his life starting little holes 
in different spots and never going on with any 
one of them? You would think him a lunatic. 
Yet that is exactly what ninety-nine men out of a 
himdred do in this life. We are all of us locked 
up here, all of us imprisoned by conditions 
through which we must bore a hole if we want to 
get out and amount to an3d:hing. We try this 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 123 

way and try that way and try the other, and do 
nothing, whereas by trying one way and keeping 
at that way we could get out in the end. 

"We have talked on this subject of concentra- 
tion to young men before. We shall talk about 
it again. You cannot succeed in the big thing if 
you let the little things take up your mind and 
your time. 

"If your best thought goes to the selection of 
a straw hat, and your second best thought to the 
selection of your clothes, and your third best 
thought to some profound speculation on the 
races or the result of the baseball competition, 
what kind of thought is left for the real work? 

"And what in the world can help you or give 
you any kind of success, except steady grinding 
at the real work? 

"When you wake up in the morning say to 
yoiirself, 'I am going to keep at my work and 
think of nothing else to-day.' Don't think with 
how little work you can get through to-day, but, 
on the contrary, how much work you can get 
into it. Whatever you have undertaken to do, 
do it better than the next man, and not only 
better than the next man, but as well as it is 
possible for you to do it. 

"We do not share the comfortable theory that 
any man can achieve anything that he desires 
if he will work hard enough. That is not true. 
Edison could not possibly have painted as well 
as Sargent, and Sargent could not possibly have 
developed Edison's inventive genius. 



124 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"But neither Edison nor Sargent, nor any other 
man that you hear about, would have been a 
success if he had n't kept one thing in his mind 
all the time. 

"Your mind is the tool that you have to work 
with. Hands and feet are the small tools, the 
servants of the working brain, the real tool. 
Keep the brain clear, clean, and concentrated. 
Don't load it up with unnecessary burdens, unnec- 
essary interests. Toward life's frivolities and 
useless discussions — excepting those that really 
improve the mind — let your mental attitude be, 
'I don't know and I don't care. I am playing 
a game against time and against life. I have got 
to win it, and I can't let other things interfere 

with it.' " 

THE TALKING GOLFER 

Four gentlemen were in the game. One, 
known to all except himself as "the talking 
golfer," annoyed the others by chattering most 
of the time. 

The next time they met on the links the talking 
delegate was avoided. He came to the others, 
however, and requested to be allowed to follow 
the game and keep score. One player said it 
would be all right if he did not talk. He said, 
"Agreed." 

In five holes' play he maintained absolute 
silence, the silence so completely taking the place 
of incessant talking that it got on the nerves of 
one of the players. Consequently his game was 
very poor. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 125 

The otherwise harmless but silent man was 
standing at a respectful distance behind the 
player, who was about to make a hard four-foot 
putt. Before playing, however, he showed un- 
usual nervousness and suddenly turned on the 
silent scorer, and prayerfully said : ' ' For heaven's 
sake, stop thinking!" 

MATCH MAKING 

. In making a match one must use good judg- 
ment — a poorly made match may lose the game 
before the start. Harry Vardon ought to be a 
good "mentor" on this point. He says: 

"One of the most difficult problems of golf is 
the fixing up of matches on equitable handicap 
terms. Players everywhere are visiting links 
that are strange and meeting fellow enthusiasts 
of whose form they know nothing save for the 
information which is conveyed by a club handi- 
cap, and although close and enjoyable rounds 
often result from contests that are arranged when 
each side is more or less in the dark as to the 
measure of the other's ability, the standard of 
scratch varies so appreciably in different clubs 
that many bad bargains are bound to be struck 
through unavoidable and mutual ignorance. 

"Where it is possible to deduce from the names 
of the plus and scratch men at any two clubs that 
the standard of start-allotting at those institutions 
is practically uniform, I think that the members 
may safely adopt the general custom of conced- 
ing and receiving in their matches three fourths 



126 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

of the difference between the handicaps. It is 
sometimes said that this practice is illogical and 
unfair, and that the better players ought to give 
the full difference, but the system has stood 
the test of time very well, and it seems to me 
to work out excellently in the end. A profes- 
sional hears accounts of many of the matches 
contested by the members of the club to which he 
is attached and, incidentally, of a thousand and 
one other games. So far as I have been able to 
judge, there is nothing the matter with the prin- 
ciple of the golfer with the shorter allowance 
giving three fourths of the difference between 
the handicaps. After all, it is founded on a sound 
premise, namely, that the inferior player is calcu- 
lated to need a longer start in a medal round for 
the reason that he is more likely than his superior 
to suffer a bad hole. When he loses a hole in 
the match game it does not matter how many 
strokes he takes to it; there is no greater penalty 
for expending three shots in a bimker than for 
missing a yard putt for a half. In medal play 
the three bunker strokes are each a black mark. 
"Occasionally it happens that almost exas- 
perating situations are presented to the receivers 
of strokes, and I am reminded of a curious hard- 
ship that befell a member of the South Herts 
Club some time ago. The occasion was a bogey 
competition, but the position might have been 
just the same if the player in question had 
been opposing a scratch man. Receiving eleven 
strokes, he finished two holes up. That was 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 127 

fairly satisfactory, but he felt very reasonably 
aggrieved when he discovered that, if he had 
received only nine strokes he would have been 
six up! We went through the card, and there 
could be no mistaking the matter; his only 
trouble was that the handicapping committee had 
given him two strokes too many to allow him to 
reap the full reward of his play. This paradoxical 
situation arose, of course, through the strokes 
having to be used at prescribed holes. The 
places at which nine strokes had to be taken would 
have suited his figures far better than the list 
of eleven holes which he was obliged to honor. 
Still, it is not often that anything quite so trying 
as that occurs in golf. 

"Where two players do not know one another's 
form and want to be sure of a good game without 
taking what they might regard as imdue risks, 
there are several well-conceived plans for achieving 
the end. I was introduced to an example a short 
time ago. The idea was that the side which won 
a hole had to give a stroke at the next. So long 
as the contestants are not too violently disparate 
in the matter of ability, it is wonderful how 
exciting a game this kind of match generally 
produces. When you have gained a lead of one 
the great thing is to struggle to win the next hole, 
so as to become two up; if you can do that, you 
ought to be safe. With most tantalizing regu- 
larity, however, are you prevented from achieving 
this purpose; somehow the necessity of giving a 
stroke immediately after winning a hole seems to 



128 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

hold you in constant bondage. I know that when 
I engaged in such a match neither of us was ever 
more than one up. It may be an artificial way of 
securing an interesting finish, but it is good fim 
all the -time. 

" There is much to be said for bisques as a form 
,of handicapping. Some players do not like to 
have to take their strokes at prearranged holes, 
possibly because they like those holes so much as 
to feel that they can obtain them in the proper 
figures without the aid of an allowance, and in 
such cases the shorter-handicap man is not 
necessarily giving anything away if he agrees to 
the introduction of the bisque system. Person- 
ally, I have rather a warm comer in my heart for 
it, because it calls for the exercise of some judg- 
ment on the part of the receiver of strokes, and 
the more that is dependent on the faculty for 
doing the right thing at the right time, the greater 
is the interest in the match." 

HYPNOTISM IN GOLF 

Are we going to use hypnotism to get back on 
our game of golf ? Is there an efficacy in psycho- 
therapeutics and golf? Will the latter combina- 
tion become the vogue? 

These and a myriad other similar queries were 
asked recently by golf students as the result of a 
story that came from London. It seemed a far 
cry from the imdulating acres of the country club 
to the temples of psychology, but the critics were 
taught to see the connection — taught to say. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



129 



perhaps in a facetious manner, that the season's 
style in golf would be to have a Svengali for 
every Trilby of the links. 

The story as it came to American golfers from 
London was that an insular golfer who had "gone 




In -diicl- En 



practice. 







^ 



Oh! What a difference 



off his game" placed himself at Guy's hospital 
in the hypnotic department. By suggestion a 
mental specialist impressed upon his patient the 
fact that he was still as good a golfer as ever. 
After the treatment he went out to the links and 
played the best golf of his career. 

The "pay lead" was so rich that for a time there 
was no golf club in the United States that escaped 
having its symposium on this rather remarkable 
London story. Opinions were divided, many 
admitting there was a distinct connection between 
nerves and golf, and psychotherapeutics could 
perform what amounted almost to golfing miracles. 
However, all were united on the criticism that 



I30 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

there must be complete coordination of mind and 
muscle before a golfer could hope to "put a crimp 
in Colonel Bogey." 

"The Londoner is perfectly right," said a well- 
known Chicago golfer, a picturesque character on 
many of ' the courses in the Chicago district. 
"I worked that out long ago, and it has helped 
my game not a little. 

"My theory is deducted from the scientific 
brain-cell theory. When one is learning golf he 
learns many bad habits of the game along with 
the good ones. Every item of his golf experience 
is registered in the brain cells — the good habits 
and the bad. As the game improves the bad cells 
wilt a trifle and the cells representing the good 
habits flourish. 

"But after a golfer has played too long — after 
he has gone stale, as the saying goes — the bad 
cells begin to reassert themselves. He 'goes off 
his game.' Then, instead of continmng play, he 
must rest. Or, as the London specialist advises, 
he must have his brain cells attended to. The 
bad cells must be reduced and the good ones 
encouraged. It is all as clear as day to me. I 
have played golf nearly every day since 1900, 
and I think my theory is worth something, if 
experience coimts." 

"You want every golfer to be a Trilby," said 
the editor of a golf magazine. "Well, out in 
Jackson Park every morning in the summer you 
can see them pla3dng in their bare feet, and I 
should consider that an excellent opening for an 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 131 

ambitious Svengali. What a golfer needs now and 
then is something to soothe his nerves. Whether 
it shall be a highball or 'Ben Bolt' is for him 
to decide. My experience has been that they 
usually prefer the former." 

"Do you think the idea a good one?" he was 
asked. 

"Anything is good in the winter," he replied 
cynically. 

One of the recent woman champions said 
she had never consulted a mental specialist before 
going into important matches. 

"It is a fact, though, that I become terribly 
nervous, and as a result of it play a much better 
game. I can make strokes in a match that I 
would never dream of in practice. Do you think 
it is because my friends all sit about and want me 
to win, and in this way practically hypnotize me 
into victories?" she asked. "If so I thank them 
most heartily for it. I hope they will continue 
vibrating for me for a long time to come." 



// angry — some would say "mad" — say 
nothing, but saw wood. 



CHAPTER XI 

ODDITIES OF GOLF 

MOONLIGHT GOLF 

ONE of the most remarkable exhibitions of 
golfing under difficulties was reported a 
few years ago, when A. J. Watson of Dunwoodie 
Country Club in New York negotiated an 
eighteen-hole roimd by moonlight in eighty-four 
strokes. 

"Mr. Watson started from the first tee at 8 135 
P.M. and finished the entire round in two hours 
and ten minutes. About twenty-five club mem- 
bers followed the play, some of them helping the 
four professional caddies who had been engaged 
to 'keep an eye on the ball.' 

"No one who has not tried to play golf by the 
light of the moon can realize its difficulties. Even 
in the brightest moonlight it is impossible to see 
the ball in flight. The only method of tracing it 
is by sound. The caddies and gallery scatter 
out in front of the player and listen for the ball to 
drop after they hear it click from the impact of 
the club. 

"Mr. Watson was particularly fortunate in 
not losing his ball once, his greatest luck in this 
way being on the drive from the thirteenth tee. 
The ball crashed into a tree on the edge of the 
woods and rebounded to the edge of the fair-green 
on the opposite side of the coiu-se. 

132 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 133 

"The Dunwoodie course is unusually hilly and 
difficult, the bogey is eighty, and the wonderful 
score of eighty-four will be appreciated by golfers 
all over the country. Few players ever get below 
eighty on the course by daylight — Mr. Watson's 
best day round being seventy-eight. About a 
year before, Mr. Watson made a similar moonlight 
attempt, making a ninety-two, which was regarded 
as phenomenal. 

' ' The start was particularly auspicious . Playing 
from the first tee with a mid-iron, Mr. Watson 
laid the ball on the green about ten feet from the 
cup. He holed out in his second, making the 
hole in two strokes under bogey. The second was 
a hole par four. On the third a short second shot 
and three putts on the green resulted in a seven. 

"On the fifth and sixth holes Mr. Watson's 
drives were close to two hundred yards. Aside 
from the third hole, the ninth was the only one 
on which there was much overscoring. Here the 
play is all up hill. Mr. Watson should have had 
a five, but an overapproach put him in the 
rough just beyond the green, from which place he 
took three putts. He was out in forty-one. 

"Coming in, Mr. Watson played a more ac- 
curate game than most of the members can play 
by daylight. He had five fives, a six, a four, and 
a three. His five on the last hole (six himdred 
yards) was one below par. 

The drive was fully two hundred yards, but 
the ball rested in a hanging lie. In attempting 
to get it out with distance Mr. Watson almost 



134 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

missed his second shot, getting not more than 
fifty yards. His third, however, was a magnifi- 
cent recovery, and his fourth landed on the edge 
of the green. By this time several members had 
come out from the clubhouse to see the finish, 
and with the green surrounded, Watson holed 
out the fifty-foot putt." 

EYE MUST BE ON THE BALL 

While on the subject of moonlight golf, I 
should like to further emphasize the value of 
"keeping the eye on the ball." All players have 
had the admonition, "Keep your eye on the ball," 
more often than any other word of caution. 

One moonlight night at Wheaton, several club 
members went out to putt on the splendid 
eighteenth green at the Chicago Golf Course. It 
was about ten o'clock. A single dimly lighted 
candle was held by one of the attendants standing 
at the hole. The average distance of first putt 
was about fifteen yards, really from extreme 
comers of the green. It was useless to look at 
the hole while putting, as nothing could be seen 
but the dim candle light which flickered in the 
light breeze and certainly did not help the light 
of the moon at that distance. 

In making the stroke each player was forced to 
fasten his eye on the ball; the light of the moon 
compelled this. Stating it in another way, the 
absence of daylight made it necessary to see 
the ball intensely. The ball was therefore hit 
in every case before the eye could be taken off. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 135 

Dependence was placed entirely on direction for 
six inches in front and behind the ball and on 
force necessary to go the distance. 

The surprising thing was the number of twos 
that were obtained. The threes were few 
compared with the twos. Three- and four-foot 
putts seemed to be as easy by moonlight as a two- 
foot in the daylight. We concluded the differ- 
ence was, in the short putts especially, that in 
daylight putting, at a distance of two to five 
feet the hole and the ball may be seen at the same 
time. Therefore the eye is likely to turn slightly, 
which gives a tendency to pull or slice. 

If the reader will try the experiment on some 
pleasant moonlight night, he will have a new 
emphasis and value placed on the admonition, 
"Keep your eye on the ball." 

SNOW GOLF 

A writer imknown to me has prepared such 
an excellent article on "snow golf" that I cannot 
refrain from utilizing it. My regret, however, is 
that I have been unable to ascertain the author's 
name so as to give him credit. Or perhaps it 
was a feminine hand that guided the pen. 

"It is a fine morning. Is it a fine morning? 
Yes, for the sim is flooding the gray concrete 
streets and the coppery green roofs with the 
palest amber light, very pale indeed, the meager 
sunshine of winter. No, for now huge, hungry 
clouds swing their leaden curtains before the 
amber sim and hide him from the world, while 

10 



136 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

down the northerly gale come a hundred million 
little flakes of white, speeding, driving, writhing, 
whirling, dancing as they die. The golfers leave 
the breakfast table to stare out apprehensively 
at the weather. Shall they go? A question! 
Don't you see that the green coppery roofs and 
the creamy walls and the gray concrete streets are 
eating up all the flakes as fast as they fall ? On 
with the game! Besides, the weather prediction 
is for snow to-night or to-morrow — not to-day. 
This is only a flurry. 

"The golfers take trolley, take boat, take the 
long road across the hills and meadows to the 
club. And lo! within one short hour and a half 
all the world of green velvet turf has turned white, 
is blanketed and tucked away under an inch of 
snow. The trees are dressed in furry white for 
Christmas. The rugged young maples have the 
slim white birches for partners, and they dance a 
gay tarantella to the piping of the gale, waving 
fluffy white scarfs on their drooping arms as they 
turn. Father Winter is here. The familiar 
landscape magically changed is a joy. Who can 
keep his eye on the ball with all the world danc- 
ing madly about him, with all the world a mass 
of blinding white, a kaleidoscope with two hun- 
dred shades of white incessantly appearing and 
vanishing? 

"What, blot this new white world with the 
brown blur of a tee of sand from the sand box? 
Never. The golfers, one by one, make tees of 
snow, stamp hard on the soft white blanket so 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 137 

that their hob-nails will bite into the turf hidden 
below, and send their drives spatting northward 
against the myriads of flakes — the devouring 
teeth of the keen gale. There's play for you, Mr. 
Softsides, reading your morning paper by the 
fireplace! Stand with your cheek to the knife of 
the wind while the Snow Devil sprays his chilling 
bullets down yoiir hot neck and hisses in your eyes. 
Steady now. Your arms feel thick as legs in the 
heavy woolen swathings, but shoot the hands 
clean away at the finish just as if it were mid-Jime. 
Well driven, sir! A clean carry of one hundred 
and seventy against the gale and only a little, 
very little slice. Next up. Another good drive. 

"The players left the tee with free, careless 
strides. Of course they were going to step right 
up to the balls. One hundred and fifty — sixty — 
seventy yards, and not a ball in sight. Forward, 
then! Still no ball! Five minutes pass. Eter- 
nity is here. They have been lost for ages in the 
frozen north. The gale is their dirge. 

"'Let's build an igloo and camp here till 
spring,' says Dick, who has a great fondness for 
arctic exploring. 

" ' Here it is ! ' shouts Midge. The other caddy 
and the two players foregather. Where is the 
ball? Here it is. Where? Here — right here. 
All they can see is a fluffy snow wheel standing on 
its edge and looking like the fuzzy collar of a toy 
Boston bull. Careful inspection reveals at the 
center of the snow wheel the little white golf ball, 
like the head of the toy Boston bull. Pick up the 



138 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

ball, knock the snow off it against the blade of the 
cleek, tee it up on a solitary spire of green that 
still defies overwhelming death, and slam 'er out 
for a good hundred and sixty. Fine! Got the 
range? Right on that tallest cedar and forty 
yards this side of the bunk. Now Buxton is tee- 
ing up. No, Biixton is not teeing up. And for 
exceeding good reason — he can't find his ball. 

" ' Put down another and play three,' says Dick. 
'You really shouldn't be penalized for lost ball 
on the fair-green.' 

" 'Good Lord ! do I look as soft as that?' Buxton 
asks. 'Come on: yoiu- hole if you find yours.' 

"They go on. They find it. Why is it the 
eternal, inevitable, inescapable rule in golf that if 
A loses his ball on a hole B cannot to save his soul 
lose his ball on the same hole? 'Tis a weary 
warld, as Tammas Weary-warld truly said, and 
few there be that bide in it ! Dick is on the green 
in three, then draws his trusty putter and takes 
six more strokes before he can force the depraved, 
doddering wretch of a ball to hole out. Hole 
out? Hech! Not he! The soggy, stupid ball 
gathered arotind itself an enormous fluffy snow 
collar, rolled in it as far as the hole, then fell 
across the hole, the snow collar too big to drop in 
and holding up the ball to stare heaven in the face. 

"'There's no rule against this,' says Dick, and 
gets down on all foiurs and breathes on the ball 
till it melts through the snow collar and plops 
down into the cup. Resourcefulness, what? 

" Dick is short in the swamp from the second tee 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 139 

and Biixton puts out a screamer. Faces are red 
from the peppering of coimtless crystal flakes, 
and hands are red from stripping snow collars 
off the balls. Dick is home in four, but Buxton 
lands his second shot on the green and then, with 
intelligence rare in one so young, putts with his 
mid-iron and lays the ball dead within three inches 
of the cup. A four on the second, eh. f* Does Mr. 
Good-player laugh at a four on the second against 
a howling white norther? Very well. Two to 
one he can't do it in four on the Fourth of July. 
(That will hold him for a while.) 

"Putting with the mid-iron will save a multitude 
of strokes on every green. That is the first great 
rule of snow golf. The other was discovered on 
the third hole and followed faithfully thereafter — 
simply get the range by landmarks on the spot 
where the ball drops. Walk to the spot. There 
will appear a bare bit of green, showing where the 
ball lit. Go forward then twenty feet or so and 
find a string of neat little prints like the trail of a 
rabbit. At the end of the trail lies your ball, 
coyly hid in his snow collar. 

"Does snow golf pay? Ask Dick and Buxton. 
They didn't lose another ball. They never 
saw so wonderfiil and charming a land as the new 
white snow coimtry they played in. They 
finished all even, and they went home with 
appetites so keen and ferocious that they re- 
sembled the ogre in the song who 

"Ate the church and ate the steeple, 
Opened the door and ate all the people." 



I40 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

UNUSUAL INCIDENTS ON THE LINKS 

The many unusual incidents which contin- 
ually happen to make each game different from 
the rest are a part of golf. Some of the most 
peculiar incidents of this kind have recently been 
compiled by Edward W. Townsend, author of 
Chimmie Fadden and Major Max, as follows: 

"With former President William Howard Taft 
on one side of the ocean and ex-Premier Balfour 
on the other, praising and delighting in the 
physical benefits of golf, that aspect of the game 
threatens to divert public attention from its 
other attractive qualities. It is a game of mys- 
teries and surprises. 

"When Mr. Balfour spoke of it recently as a 
silent game, there was on this side of the Atlantic 
amazed dissent. The weather itself, said our 
golfers, is no greater incentive to speech. Even 
when Mr. Balfour's interpreters explained that he 
spoke of the time consiimed in making the rounds 
of the links as proper seasons of silence, not of 
the greater time thereafter consumed in discussing 
the rounds, Americans still failed to understand. 
That is because we play the game on this side in 
a different spirit from that in which it is played 
on the other side, and especially in Mr. Balfour's 
ain coimtree. 

"A story will illustrate the point. Two 
devotees of the game were making the round, and 
fourteen holes had been played without the 
exchange of a single word. At the fifteenth hole 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 141 

McPhearson ran down a thirty-foot putt, and, as 
it halved the match, it was so doubly dear to him 
that it loosened his tongue. 

" " T was a fair putt — eh, Douglas ?' he remarked 
to his opponent. 

"There was no response to this unseemly 
garrulity. 

"McPhearson won the next hole and halved 
the last, which gave him the game, one up. Again 
self-satisfaction moved him to speech. 

"'A fine day for the game,' he remarked. 

"'Aye,' Douglas admitted cautiously. 'But 
that's no reason you should be clacking Uke an 
auld wife every minute of the time,' 

"Americans are perhaps too much addicted to 
the pleasures of speech to be silent even at golf, 
in spite of impressive traditions. It is not 
such a serious matter with us as with Britons. 
We take it more as a sport, less as war, and 
persist, most of us, in adding to the joy of outdoor 
rambling the pleasure of desultory conversation. 

"No game offers more mysteries, more marvels 
to incite to talk. Take that effective irritant to 
loquacity, 'holing out in one.' As there are hun- 
dreds of holes easily within the range of single 
strokes, and as somewhere on the earth there are 
daily thousands of enthusiasts at play, the wonder 
would seem to be that the feat is not so common 
as no longer to excite our special wonder; yet the 
accepted records, made in competitions, fill but 
a few paragraphs in the books. On the other 
hand, there is the astonishing record of a Scottish 



142 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

golfer, L. Stuart Anderson, who has holed seven 
holes in one each, and not the same hole twice. 

"Hiindreds of important tournaments are 
played without a hole being made from the tee; 
but, on the other hand, at Englewood, New 
Jersey, in the professional tournament recently, 
Gordon, of Onondaga, and Ross, of Brae Bum, 
both holed the fifteenth in one. This record was 
surpassed, however, by Mr. J. Ireland, playing at 
Worlington, in Suffolk, in 1907, when in a single 
round he holed the fifth and eighteenth each in a 
single stroke. 

"But the most wonderful of all wonders in 
this respect happened in 1870, at old Musselburgh, 
the famous resort of Edinburgh golfers. A 
foursome had been started late in the afternoon, 
and when the balls were driven from the eight- 
eenth tee it was so nearly dark that there was a 
hurrying of caddies and players to find them. 
Robert Clark, who had driven for his side, had 
sent off what seemed, so far as it could be followed 
in the dim light, a good ball, but it could not be 
located. His and his partner's caddies and both 
players searched without success until they had to 
admit their opponents' claim of 'lost ball,' involv- 
ing, of course, under the rule, the loss of the hole. 

"This was the more regretfully conceded by 
the losing side because the loss of the hole, as it 
happened, also meant the loss of the match. And 
then — you have already guessed the conclusion — 
the lost ball was found in the cup. The hole was 
made in one, yet lost! 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 143 

"The amazing things a golf ball will do besides 
going into the hole with promptness and dispatch 
supply material for many a true tale. A Morbury 
player one day in 1900 concluded that his ball 
was trying to pay for itself when, upon coming 
up to it after a drive, he found it in a good He 
and with a sixpence nicely balanced upon it. 

"Indeed, bright objects seem to have an 
irresistible attraction for golf balls. Another 
English player, at Huddlesford, drove a ball 
which hooked off toward a workman wielding a 
shining scythe. At the cry of 'Fore!' the man 
turned, the ball struck the edge of the keen blade, 
and was sliced as fairly in two as you could slice 
an orange with a knife. 

"At St. Andrews, in 1907, a member of the 
Royal and Ancient Club drove a ball which 
struck the point of a hatpin far projecting beyond 
the side structure of a hat worn by a woman 
crossing the course, and it struck hard enough to 
fasten itself like a second head to the same pin. 
Fashion saved her. The lady's head was so well 
bimkered with hair, or whatever, that she was 
not hurt. 

"The ladies — bless them! — have contributed 
liberally of objects of art and necessity for the 
fatal attraction of golf balls. At Troon, in 1907, 
a Mr. Andrew foimd his ball empaled on a hairpin. 
He finally worried it, thus adorned, into the hole, 
but it took the distracted player ten strokes to 
do it. In the same year a professional at Brad- 
ford Moor, on coming up to his ball, playing to 



144 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

the second hole, found it trussed by a hairpin, 
and it cost him five putts to induce the foolish 
object to drop into the cup. 

"By the way, players who hereafter come up 
to a ball under such painful circumstances may 
remove the misplaced ornament without penalty. 
Since balls got the hairpin habit, the governing 
powers have attended to the matter, and so ruled. 

"But many a ball has sought other than a 
shining mark on its wayward coiirse to the hole. 
Driving off from the first tee on a misty day, a 
player at the West Herts Club, Cassiobury Park, 
felt that he had foozled; but none other than his 
sense of touch gave him a hint of what had 
happened, for no caddie or spectator had seen 
the ball after the club came down. After a 
fruitless search another ball was driven. When 
the first green was reached, one of the spectators 
became aware that something was interfering 
with the correct set of his trousers, and an 
examination disclosed, in the turn-up at the 
bottom of one leg, a golf ball — the missing ball! 

"Many records of 'kills,' as they say at the 
traps, have been made by driven balls, but usually 
the victims have been small birds. Captain 
Ferguson, however, playing at Kilspindie, in 1904, 
drove a long ball into the rough, and, coming to 
it, found that he had made a record for golf balls 
as deadly weapons — his had killed a hare. 

"Another Scot, coming in late, putted on the 
eighteenth green, and saw his ball, which was 
seemingly headed straight for the hole, deflected 



PRO AND CON OP GOLP i45 

by what he supposed in the half Hght to be a stiff 
leaf. The ' leaf ' proved to be a field mouse, which, 
half stunned, was carried to the clubhouse as 
'Exhibit A' in another story of the strange 
happenings which cause players to lose holes. 

"An extraordinary story of a golf-ball kill is 
vouched for by so respectable an authority as 
The Golfers^ Handbook, from which, without 
omission or addition, I quote this brief chronicle. 
Far be it from me to polish so precious a gem : 

" 'A golfer at Newark, in May, 1907, drove 
the ball into the river. The ball struck a trout, 
two poiinds in weight, and killed it.' 

"Animal life on the golf links is not always 
opposed to the players. At the 'nineteenth 
hole,' as golfers call the club cafe, stories have 
been told of crows which have pounced upon 
golf balls and carried them off, perhaps to satisfy 
their curiosity as to the nature of the little globes 
with which man so much concerns himself. But 
I have never until recently come upon a respect- 
able confirmation of such a story. 

"A Glasgow newspaper — and it is impossible 
to suspect a Scottish journal trifling with such a 
subject — states as a fact that recently a Mr. W. 
M. Greig, while playing to the twelfth hole at 
St. Andrews, saw his tee shot povinced upon by a 
large crov/, which Hfted it in his beak, and pro- 
ceeded to make a Wright Brothers exhibition. 
It flew straight toward the hole for some distance, 
and then, finding the weight too much for its 
motor power, dropped it in a good lie; whereby 



146 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

the delighted Mr. Greig was enabled to win the 
hole. His opponent unsuccessfully tried to con- 
found him with Rule 22, which reads, in part: 

" 'If a ball lodge in anything moving, a ball 
shall be dropped as near as possible to the place 
where the object was when the ball lodged in it, 
without penalty.' 

"Many American players have wondered what 
was the sense of that rule, not knowing that on 
many British links only the putting greens are 
mowed, the grass on the fair-greens being kept 
short by grazing sheep. Many a ball has lodged 
on the woolly backs of sheep, which have scam- 
pered off with them. 

"That reference to rules recalls a favorite 
story of Scottish professionals. Sandy and 
Donald were playing a close match — serious and 
silent, of course. To the right of the line of play 
from one tee, yet within bounds, stood the 
ancient cottage of the green-keeper, but so far 
to the right that a ball must have had what 
Jerome Travers calls 'the father of all slices' to 
reach it. Well, Sandy drove a ball with just 
that kind of a slice; it ciirved and curved until it 
finally flew into an open window of the cottage. 

"Players and caddies followed, and found the 
ball floating in a pan of bluing-water. Sandy 
declared that he would lift and drop the ball. 
Donald agreed, but remarked that it would be 
at the penalty of a stroke — Rule 14, first para- 
graph. Sandy demiirred; this was casual water 
not in a hazard — Rule 14, second paragraph. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 147 

"To settle the fine point involved, the wife of 
the green-keeper, known to be a close student 
of the rules, was called in from the drying-grounds, 
where she was hanging out her good man's ' body- 
linen.' 

"'Did that water,' she was asked, 'constitute 
a hazard, or was it casual?' 

"She gave thought to the momentous question, 
and decided in Sandy's favor. Never before 
could she remember to have done so unhouse- 
wifely a thing as to leave a basin of bluing-water 
on the floor; it was unusual — casual. 

"Sandy Hfted and dropped his ball, and, 
taking good care with his mashie, shot the ball 
through an open door and well on its way to the 
hole. 

"Freak golf is thought by many to be a develop- 
ment of the more whimsically minded American 
players, and surely we have had some amazing 
examples of freak-playing conditions; yet a 
carefiil search of the literature on that point 
shows that our sober-sided cousins in the old 
coimtry have developed some very fair lines of 
freak streaks. There was, for example, that 
Sandwich golfer who wagered a fellow club 
member that he could beat him at a certain 
ntimber of holes, using a champagne bottle only 
as a club for all his strokes, his opponent to have 
the use of all the clubs in his bag. The record 
is gravely printed that the wielder of the bottle 
won the match. 

"The comment is sometimes added that the 



148 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

opponent must have been the king of all duffers. 
My own opinion is that normally he may have 
been a fair player, but that the man who proposed 
the bet arranged before the start that while he 
should carry the bottle, his opponent should 
carry its contents. 

"There are reliable data concerning two famous 
freak plays credited to Americans. In 1899 a 
bet of four thousand dollars was made in the 
Allegheny Club, Pittsburgh, that a ball could be 
played through four miles of the city's streets in 
one hundred and fifty strokes or less. The start 
was made soon after daylight, William Patten, 
one of the club's low-handicap players, being 
selected to attempt the task. The play was 
accomplished in one hundred and nineteen 
strokes, and at a fair profit, even after the win- 
ners had paid five hundred dollars for broken 
window glass. 

"The famous Hackensack game of the fol- 
lowing year was more sportsmanlike. Tliree 
members of the Hackensack Club imdertook to 
play a course from their links to the North Jersey 
Links, a distance of six miles. This was a cross- 
country course over meadows and cornfields, 
across streams and bayous, over paved roads and 
railroads. Followed as closely as roads permitted 
by enthusiastic fellow members in automobiles 
carrying first aid to the weary, hungry, and 
thirsty, three members made the course — J. W. 
Haulenbeek and Eugene Crassons, each in three 
himdred and five strokes, and Dr. Pfarre, in 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 149 

three hundred and twenty-seven. British author- 
ities have given much attention to this contest, 
for it is thought by experts to be a remarkable 
thing, conditions considered, that two of the 
players should have finished with identical scores. 

"Astonishing feats with golf clubs are told by 
the score. It was as long ago as 1858, at North 
Inch, Perth, that the club's professional drove a 
ball — and with a full swing, too — off the face 
of a watch without injuring the glass. At 
Westbrook, in this country, in 1901, E. T. Knapp 
slightly dented one end of an egg to afford a lie 
for a golf ball, teed up on the egg, and drove the 
baU, leaving the egg iminjured. 

"Professionals have pitched balls with mashies 
out of deep quarries and over chiirch spires, but 
that sort of magic seems futile compared to 
mashie work the present writer saw 'Young' Tom 
Anderson do on the eighteenth green of the links 
at Montclair, New Jersey. Taking six balls, 
Anderson placed one eight inches from the hole, 
and arranged the other five, at intervals of eight 
inches, in an exact line with the first ball and the 
hole. That is, he laid five stimies. With his 
mashie he began with the ball farthest from the 
hole, and pitched it cleanly into the cup. He pro- 
ceeded to do the same with all five stimied balls, 
then pitched the sixth in on top of the others. 

"There was a feat which to the wondering and 
longing mind of the amateur has more in it to 
stir the soul than has the marvelously preserved 
integrity of an eggshell or the crystal of a watch." 



ISO PRO AND CON OF GOLF 




Photograph by Sport and General 

The scene of Mr. Simpson's drive 



5"«2«MOI 




TEE 



Courtesy of the "Daily Mail" 

Diagram showing how Mr. Simpson did the fifth hole 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 151 













n 


n 


4 


n 


^'-i 


1 


H- 


- MBSS^M^^S 


1 


1 



Photograph by Sport and General 

Where the ball dropped into the hole 

A DREAM THAT CAME TRUE 

A remarkable "hole-in-one" story is told by 
the London Daily Mail. The Mail says: 

"It has fallen to the lot of Rochford Hundred 
Golf Club, near Southend-on-Sea, to regale the 
golfing world with the most wonderful 'hole-in- 
one' story ever told, A golfer's dream was ful- 
filled next day while an Easter competition was 
in progress. One of the members, Mr. E. Simp- 
son, amused a room full of golfers, waiting in 
the clubhouse till the rain should cease, by relating 
how on the previous evening he dreamed that he 
'holed out the fifth in one.' 

' ' The fifth hole is a ' bogey three' of one hundred 
and fifty yards. The tee is placed on a slight 
eminence with a hedge in front. A muddy pond 
m^ust be diagonally carried on the way to the 
green, which is guarded on the right by a high 
boundary fence, and on the left by a range of grass 
bunkers. The bed of the pond, when periodically 
dredged, yields a heavy harvest of lost balls. 

11 



152 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"Among those present when Mr. Simpson 
related his dream (before going out to play) were 
F. R. Tutton, E. R. P. Homphray, Forsyth John- 
stone, and R. A. Foster. The latter couple pre- 
ceded Mr. Simpson and his partner (a visitor) 
when the- weather permitted. 

"On reaching the fifth green and holing out, 
Messrs. Johnstone and Foster stood to watch 
Mr. Simpson's iron shot from the fifth tee. The 
ball dropped some twenty feet from the flag, 
trickled gently onward, and, to the amazement of 
the watching players and their caddies, dropped 
into the hole with, as a caddie remarked, 'the 
last breath in its body.' " 

A LIE ON A STUMP 

Charles (Chick) Evans tells of a famous freak 
shot in such an interesting manner that I cannot 
refrain from giving it here. He says: 

"A few years ago a number of trees on the south 
nine at Beverly had been cut to about three feet 
of the ground. O. J. Frances, George O'Neil, 
Nelson Buck, and P. J. Roy were playing to the 
eighth green. Mr. Frances played his second shot 
and walked over the slight incline guarding the 
green. To his astonishment, the ball coiild not be 
seen an3rwhere. Finally George O'Neil discovered 
it on the perfectly flat surface of a stump to the 
left of the green. The stump was about three 
feet high and as smooth as glass. Landing on 
that stump seemed strange, but staying there 
afterward was simply miraculous. Mr. Frances 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 153 

attempted to play it standing on George O'Neil's 
back, but O'Neil moved suddenly and the player 
of the strange lie took a 'header.' The ball was 
not played, therefore, and the mystery of the lie 
remained, 

"Last year the same group was playing again 
at Beverly, and at the tenth tee a gentleman 
asked if he could walk with them. They gladly 
assented, and at the seventeenth green he said: 
'A most peculiar thing happened here several 
years ago. I was putting on the then eighth 
green, when a ball driven by players following 
ran through. For fun I placed it on the stump.' 
He then remarked to Mr. Frances : * I often wonder 
who the players were, and if I won or lost a match 
for them.' " 

FUZZY WORM WINS A HOLE 

The most minute things often have a great 
influence on a game of golf. A writer recently 
explained as follows how insects sometimes decide 
golf games: 

"It woiild seem almost impossible that such 
tiny matters as caterpillars and grasshoppers 
would figure in golf, yet instances have been 
recorded where a sizable dispute has arisen over 
just such matters. 

"A well-known golfer tells the story of a four- 
ball match which has finished at the eighteenth 
hole with the match even. They agreed to play 
an extra hole to decide the matter. The green 
was a trifle sloping and on this particular day 



154 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

it was rather keen. One ball, after the approach 
putt, came to rest a few inches above the hole. 
The player whose turn was next was a methodical 
and deliberate person, and as the match depended 
on his next shot he took an imusual length of time 
in his calculation, 

"One of those big, fuzzy caterpillars at this 
particular time happened to crawl upon the ball 
and the weight was just sufficient to distiurb the 
equilibrium of the sphere, causing it to move, and 
by a curious chance it happened to roll straight 
into the hole, carrying the fuzzy mischief-maker 
with it. The owner of the ball immediately 
claimed that it should count as having been holed 
on the previous stroke. Of course the other side 
vigorously protested and the match remained in 
dispute for several days. 

"The ultimate ruling, the matter having been 
referred to an authority to decide, was that the 
ball should have been replaced without penalty, 
on the ground that if the half had missed the cup 
and rolled ten feet below, the owner would un- 
doubtedly have wished to replace it. 

"On another occasion a grasshopper figured in 
a match during a tournament. The ground was 
hard and very fast. The ball of the opponent 
continued to roll straight for a standpit after it 
was played and it seemed as if it would be strong 
enough to trickle in, but it finally came to a stop 
on the very edge of the pit. As the player 
approached his ball a big grasshopper, which had 
been beside it, started off and disturbed the ball 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 155 

so that it toppled into the pit. The insect had 
actually kicked the ball into the hazard. The 
naiTator held that his opponent should replace 
the ball without penalty, and this was finally 
done." 

FOWL PLAY 

There was a very interesting play at the Chicago 
Golf Club a few years ago. 

A prominent lawyer, Judge , was playing 

with a fellow member of the club. At the seventh 
hole which is a bogey four, the judge drove his 
second shot, — a brassie, — for the green. It was 
perhaps twenty feet off a straight line. 

Some chickens had wandered on the green. 
The ball struck one. The shot was unfortimate 
for the chicken, but excellent for the player. The 
ball caromed off the chicken's "downy shield" 
and finally rested two inches from the hole. The 
judge had a three. 

The story would be improved if the ball had 
caught the hole for a two, but "truth is mighty 
and will prevail." 

The judge's opponent remarked, "It's o. Jowl 
play." 

STANDARD WORK 

An interesting incident occurred at the third 
hole of the Chicago Golf Club, which is a bogey 
four. 

The second shot was a mid-iron, and high. 
The ground being dry, the ball bounded into 
the air. The drop landed fairly on the very top 



iS6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

of the flag standard marking the hole. There 
it stuck. 

Although the members of the foursome were 
well informed as to the rules, none claimed accu- 
racy in "what to do." Finally it was decided 
"the ball must be played where it lies." The 
player therefore knocked the ball from the 
standard with his putter. He holed the next and 
made his four. 

It was remarked by one of the players that 
"the 'standard' of that play could not have been 
improved." 

STRANGER THINGS HAVE HAPPENED 

One pleasant day at the Exmoor Club a 
foursome was played. Near the old second tee, 
to the right, was a huge tree at an angle of about 
forty-five degrees. One of the players drove a 
ball that landed in the crotch of two branches 
and stuck there. There was a good-natured laugh 
at this as the others realized that not only the 
ball but the hole was lost by their opponent. 

One of the players on the tee was still laughing, 
thinking of the ball in the tree, when he drove. 
The ball went directly toward the same place, 
struck the other ball, knocked it out, and his 
ball remained in the crotch. 

The laugh was now on the second player, but 
he, noticing a man repairing telegraph wires near 
by, called him over and succeeded in borrowing 
his climbing spikes. He then climbed up into 
the tree, and with one stroke knocked the ball 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 157 

out and toward the hole; his next ball was on 
the green, and he made his putt, winning the 
hole in four from all three. 

The story-teller spoiled his anecdote somewhat 
by concluding: "This is absolutely true, so help 
me—" 



You cannot get best results by treat' 
ing caddies as machines, or other 
players as belonging to you. 



CHAPTER XII 
HAZARDS 

HAZARDS, of course, are the particular 
incubus of all new players of golf. They 
make the uncertainties of the best games. A 
writer has given beginners some idea of hazards 
on prominent courses of the world in the following : 

"The introduction of hazards of various sorts 
has added zest to the game of golf. The hazards 
on the older links are mostly natural, but the 
great extension of the game has made the available 
land scarce, and artificial hazards are created 
with much ingenuity. The classic hazards are 
the Alps at Prestwick, Pandy at Musselbiurgh, the 
Redan at North Berwick, and Hell at St. Andrews. 
These are all bunkers or sand pits, and we do not 
know what hand constructed them. A hazard 
that brings the mental strain is a bunker just 
short of the length of an average drive. At the 
foiuth hole at Del Monte there is such a bunker 
one hundred and forty-five yards from the tee. 
On the seventh hole on the same links there is a 
water hazard one hundred and ninety yards from 
the tee. A ball too strongly driven by an average 
player will carry into the water, while the expert 
may hope to drive over the brook. 

"Fences and railroad tracks are common 
hazards in America. There is a railroad track 
and embankment on the Shinnecock Hills links, 

158 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 159 

on Long Island, and a like barrier at Woodland, 
near Boston. Some fine judgment and skillful 
playing is required at Coronado, California, where 
the links cross the track of an old race course. 
There are fences and outbuildings to dodge, 
mental as well as physical hazards. 

"A common form of mental hazard is a thick 
growth of trees, lining the course closely. On the 
Del Monte links, mentioned above, there is such 
a growth, and many golfers who would make a 
straight shot in an open field, drive into the woods 
here. Such a course gives players a thorough 
try-out." 

The ability of the leading golf players to con- 
quer hazards varies. Another writer says: 

"If there is one particular spot in which Braid 
shines brightly it is when he has met with trouble. 
In fact, so many pictures have been taken and so 
much written about Braid's brilliancy in recover- 
ing from a trap on the rough that those who have 
never seen him play are inclined to the idea that 
only his ability to recover has made him a great 
player. In fact, Braid rarely gets into difficulties, 
but when he does one of the finest pieces of golf 
imaginable immediately follows. 

"There is only one condition that makes Braid 
fearful of trouble, and that is where it happens 
that he has no room to swing his club. Given 
that room, he will recover from almost anything. 
It is thrilling. The trouble may be rank grass 
or rocks or a railway track, and as he takes the 
club up the spectators realize that something has 



i6o 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



to go, and that the ball will go with it. He brings 
his niblick down with terrific power, and while in 




^ifmw 



Magnetized water 



a bunker, his shot is as perfect as human agency- 
can get it. Braid's ability to steer clear of 
trouble has robbed golf of many a shot that 
might be classed as magnificent." 

As preliminary hints to the beginner in his 
first rounds of a "hazardous" course, the follow- 
ing items of advice are given: 

"The great thing is to make sure of getting 
clear. You will have a very small chance of 
making a good recovery if you are trying at the 
same time to leave yourself lying dead. 

" It is one of the most remarkable paradoxes in 
golf that we are always glad to see our ball lying 
dead and yet we are imspeakably annoyed to find 
it lying buried. 

"The secret of playing out of long grass is that 
the club should be brought up properly. Niblicks 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF i6i 

are like children; if they are properly brought up 
they won't go wrong afterwards. 

"A pot-hunter is a contemptible person, but 
more to be pitied than blamed is the player whose 
himting of pots always results in the finding of 
pot bunkers. 

"Never laugh when yowc opponent is playing 
out of a whin bush. Remember the saying of 
Lord Bacon: In calamitoso, risus etiam injuria — 
In misfortune, even to smile is to offend. 

"The best way to get out of a hazard is not 
to get into it. The game may be lost and won 
on the green, but if you are in too many bunkers 
on the way, you will never get to the green." 



Golf and life are alike; we spend half our 
time playing into traps and the other half 
in playing out to where we should have played 
in the first place — instead of the fourth. 



CHAPTER XIII 
RESTRAINT IN GOLF 

GOLF is a game which gives infinite patience 
and steadiness to those who really try to 
play it well. Beginners are apt to disregard 
these qualities, however, in a mistaken striving 
for record drives or in an effort to lower a score. 
There has been considerable warning of late 
against strenuousness in golf, and "Archibald 
Cleek" comments on the following newspaper 
clipping : 

What is believed to be a world's record drive was 
recorded by Herbert Strong, of the Inwood Club, 
in the open event of the thirteenth annual 
United North and South Golf championship at 
Pinehurst, North Carolina. With the wind back 
of him Strong made the first green on the No. 2 
course, a distance of 408 yards. 

"Another instance of the imminent, increasing 
menace of ever-lengthening distance in our golf! 
Where is the thing to stop ? Since the noble and 
uplifting game began to be played in this country, 
less than a score of years ago, what a tremendous 
expansion has it undergone! In those primitive 
days the man who could actually drive a ball 
two hundred yards was looked up to as a demigod 
of the links. We copied not only his style and 
his clubs, but his very walk; tried even to think 
like him, if so by any happy chance we too might 
be able some day to drive two hundred yards — 

162 ' 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF ^ 163 

or at least a fine, splendid, accurately measured 
hundred and eighty. 

"Golf to-day is as different from that primitive 
pastime as a smart, six-cylinder touring car is 
different from the ancient, creeping pony phaeton 
reported by truthful travelers to exist still in the 
purlieus of Darkest England, where nothing ever 
changes. The old, clumsy, snake-headed drivers 
with necks crudely spliced and still more crudely 
wrapped have given place to the smart, whippy, 
well-balanced wooden clubs of to-day; the ancient 
shapeless irons — the cliimsy clubs of still more 
clumsy men — have been succeeded by graceful 
implements of shining steel as acctuate and 
efficient as surgeons' lancets and as beautiful 
as the swords of the daimios. Instead of the old 
solid gutta-percha ball (hard as the head of an 
i8-handicap man) we have a dainty, intricate, 
marvelously balanced concoction of finest Para 
core, wound with silky rubber threads, loaded with 
qmcksilver to make it run true in putting, and 
cased in a vulcanite shell whose uniform thickness 
does not vary by the shadow of a millimeter! 

"As a result we find the game growing steadily 
longer and longer. The ordinary duffer of to-day 
tops his ball from the tee and walks out grumbling 
and cursing to its lie, a mere two hundred yards 
away — for, thanks to the abolition of cross- 
bunkers in favor of side-traps, there is nothing 
to head off such a slovenly shot. If he swings 
clean and true with his wooden clubs he gets from 
two hundred and twenty-five to two hundred 



1 64 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

and sixty yards every time. If he is a good man, 
like Herbert Strong in the news dispatch quoted 
above — not a champion, or even a runner-up, 
but a good man — he may lay his drive on the 
green foiir himdred and eight yards away. 

■ "To what good? Is it all of golf to swipe a 
ball brobdingnagian distances? What of style? 
What of accuracy? Above all, where in this land 
of rapidly growing and congesting popiilation are 
we to find the room for this sort of golf? The 
price of beef to-day has soared so high that a good 
cut of prime roast is worth the ransom of a minor 
king. Why? Because the old open ranges 
whereon cattle by the myriads might roam as they 
willed and fatten on the sweet grasses free of 
cost have all been taken over, homesteaded, 
settled by farmers, and inclosed with impregnable 
wire fences. The free open range has followed 
the buffalo into the dim and shadowy past. The 
wide prairie has passed into history. Land is 
constantly growing in scarcity and in value. If 
we are going to drive golf balls four hundred and 
eight yards, then a hole one quarter of a mile long 
(four hundred and forty yards) will have to be 
reckoned a mere drive and a putt. A "long" 
hole will have to measure at least half a mile from 
tee to cup. The golf course of the near future 
must include twelve thousand yards of playing 
length instead of the six thousand of to-day. 
Where is the thing to end? 

"Moreover, are we to eliminate arm exercise 
from golf? Or, rather, do we wish to change the 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 165 

game from a full, hard swing once in every one 
hundred and eighty yards or less to a swing only 
once in four hundred yards or more ? In the good 
old days of the hard guttie ball the man who had 
worked his way around eighteen holes had taken 
a full morning's exercise. To-day that distance 
has become a mere stroll, punctuated at very 
rare intervals with a mild swing of the mighty 
club against the flighty ball. And consider the 
spirit of the game! When Strong drove that 
four-himdred-and-eight-yard green his troubles 
for that hole were over. How much more real 
golf he would have played if his splendid drive 
(as full of force and skill as the one we chronicle) 
had yielded him a mere two hundred yards, his 
brassie shot one hundred and eighty more, and he 
had still a pitch or run of twenty-eight yards to 
reach the hole! 

"We may safely take it as an axiom that the 
greater number of strokes absolutely needed in 
the game the greater the niimber of opporttmities 
are afforded for skill — or skill's sad opposite. 
And is it not worth while to have more shots on 
every hole? Are not the more frequent chances 
for physical exercise and the display of proficiency 
grateful to the golfer? Does he derive his chief 
joy in golf from studying problems, calculating 
chances, and executing shots — or from mere 
walking?" 

DON'T PRESS 

One of golf's lessons, says S. P. Jermain, is 
"Don't press." He goes on to say: 



1 66 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"How often in golf we realize that we should 
heed this warning but do not — and lose the game. 

"Golf, like business, is a competition in which 
one needs to be alert, energetic, ambitious, and 
forceful, but not to do with feverish haste — not 
to press. . 

"All golfers know what it is to be three down 
with six to play. The next hole must be won — a 
half will not do — par four is imperative — bogey- 
five any one can do, and so the losing golfer 
presses his drive and tops it. Fear-driven, he 
attempts a miracle for his second, and lands in a 
bunker and finally takes seven for the hole, losing 
to a six. A fairly cool head and a five would have 
won and found him but two down with five to 
play and filled with hope instead of four down 
with practically certain defeat weighting heavily 
upon his sovil. He loses, whereas he could have 
won had he played his regular steady game, and 
returns to the clubhouse depressed by the sense 
of needless failure. 

"A business man said the other day: 'I must 
go a mile a minute this year. I must surpass 
myself, and show a big gain in increased business.' 
The reply was: 'Don't.' He had been going 
'a mile a minute' for the year just closed and 
was 'all in.' A brainy, high-class man in his 
line, but perilously near the 'broken man' who 
is useless alike to the captain of industry and 
to himself. 

"Nature had nmg its bell upon the demon 
of overdoing which dominated his spirit. He had 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 167 

heard but was not heeding. He was pressing 
every shot, for he was three down with six to 
play, but can yet win, and grandly, if he plays 
within his powers — this game of business — 
normally and rationally. 
"Don't fear — don't press." 

OVERPLAYED 

Some time ago, while in England, it was 
brought to my attention that a prominent 
medical journal had suggested that on account 
of the nerve strain it causes, golf is not an ideal 
game for everybody, especially for people with 
few days or hours for recreation. 

The golfers immediately began to ridicule the 
medical journal, saying they would take more 
golf and less medicine. 

I do not care to go on record as advocating the 
playing of less golf. The participation of busi- 
ness men in golf is largely a matter for each 
individual to figure out. If a man is quite 
certain that he gets the maximum of recreation 
out of the game it would be difficult to figure how 
he can play too much. If, however, he makes 
golf hard work, he must endeavor to throw 
aside worry and care and try to take the game 
less seriously. 

Somewhere in my travels abroad I found an 
article by a critic which in apropos to this subject, 
He says: 

"But it is the excess of golf that is played on 
holidays that spoils everything in the case of the 

12 



i68 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

man of a somewhat nervous temperament and 
who may not be as strong and beefy as the John 
Bull of the pictures. Too many of these people 
seem to think that as they have gone away 
for golf they should have as much of it as they 
can get, and accordingly play to excess. Three 
rounds! Three rounds! One of the reasons why 
some men play so much — as they put it to them- 
selves — is that they wish to improve their game, 
and they conceive that the holiday time is the 
best of all to accomplish that end. But experi- 
ence shows that very seldom indeed is a man's 
game improved at such a time; very frequently 
is it injured, and that through the excess. When 
so much of it is played weariness, though half- 
unconsciously, is induced, proper pains are not 
taken at every stroke, carelessness becomes con- 
stant; then, with deterioration, too many ex- 
periments are tried, and worst of all, that 
terrible and for the time being incurable disease 
of staleness sets in, and there is then an end to 
all happiness and enjoyment. There is no cure 
for staleness except complete abstention for a time. 
"It needs some strength of mind to carry out 
such a resolve, but he who severely limits his 
golf at holiday times enjoys it the more, and he 
and his health and his game are the better for it. 
A holiday system based on wise restrictions is a 
splendid thing. Men of long experience have 
tried many of them, and the best of all is this: 
Play two rounds on the first day of the week, one 
on the second, two again on the third, one on the 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 169 

fourth, two on the fifth, one on the sixth, and take 
a whole hoUday from the game on the seventh 
day. That is not too much nor too Httle. An- 
other point for remembrance is that on the days 
that are warm and long the old convention of one 
round before Ixmch and another afterward is not 
a good one for the best and most enjoyable 
employment of the day. Much better is it to 
play in the morning, rest pleasantly — sleep, per- 
chance — in the afternoon, and play again in the 
cool of the evening, when golf is the best of all — 
always provided your course is not laid out in a 
straight line from east to west, for playing full 
against a setting sun is a most tantalizing business. 
"The little truth that there was in the indict- 
ment against the game by the doctors' paper is 
that it is possible for some men, many of them, 
to have too much of it, when it becomes bad for 
the men and bad for their game, and holidays are 
rendered failures. There was a time when really 
good golf could be got only at the seaside or very 
far away from the great centers of work and 
business. That is no longer the case, and the 
situation is that the golf we are having all the 
time at home is hard and strenuous, demanding 
great ability and thought. The golfing holiday, 
then, might very well be made an easy one on a 
links where the holes are simple, and — remember- 
ing another scare that was made by a doctors' 
organ last year — I believe that there is as happy 
golf to be had up on the hills and in the lonely 
country places as on the margin of any sunny sea." 



lyo PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

PERCENTAGE IN GOLF 

George Stallings, the leader of the Boston 
Braves, who made such a marvelous record with 
a team that looked hopeless, says, "Get the per- 
centage," and he goes on to explain briefly how 
his team won success. 

" 'Get the Percentage' is our club slogan. I 
urge the men that no matter what the play is 
they should see that our club gets the best per- 
centage. For instance, if there is a runner on 
first base the batter should try to hit to right field, 
because there is less chance of doubling the man 
at second, and his prospects of getting two bases 
on the blow if the baU should happen to fall safe 
are greatly improved. 

"Another play we made very often last ^season, 
and which led several managers to allege that I 
was crazy, was to sacrifice, with a runner on first 
base and one out. This meant that it put a 
runner on second with two out, and nothing except 
a base hit would score him. But the move won 
four or five ball games for us last season, and four 
or five count for a lot if you are coming down the 
stretch in a tight race." 

Following the "Stalling idea," therefore, I ad- 
vise "Get the percentage in golf." For example, 
if the ball lies for a chance to get over or into 
a bunker on a long iron or wooden club shot, the 
player, knowing that with corresponding lies he 
has, four out of five times, landed in that blinker, 
or made a poor shot by reason of the mental 
hazard, the percentage play is to go short of the 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 171 

trouble, then take a longer approach, with still a 
chance at one putt or a sure two. 

Again, if the ball is in the rough, Ijang fairly- 
well, the desire is to take a wooden club for dis- 
tance. Unless one is an expert he knows that 
by far the larger number of these shots go wrong, 
and that one of the iron clubs is safer. But 
"I'll take a chance this time" is the subconscious 
thought. So the percentage is sacrificed. There 
is no real team work between the head and the 
play. Stallings is right. "Get the percentage" 
aroimd the entire course, and your whole game 
will improve. Golf calls for brains as well as for 
clubs. 

THE SECOND SHOT 

Harry Vardon had just made a splendid drive, 
his ball stopping about two hundred and seventy- 
five yards from the tee and about fifteen feet 
from the right-hand rough. His opponent, not 
so expert a player, went straight down the course 
for two hundred yards. 

Mr. Blank, after saying that his thought was 
to go straight down the center as far as possible, 
asked Vardon, as they started after their balls, 
what thought was uppermost in his mind when he 
made that shot. 

Vardon responded: "My only thought was 
my second shot for the green. I happened to get 
it right that time." 

How many of us play for the second, or next 
shot, intelligently? 



172 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

A LEGEND 

"There was a valley, where the people had 
been for a long time very much depressed. They 
had poor crops, much illness, and many mis- 
fortunes which make for worry. This extended 
for over aperiod of years. Even hope was dead. 

"Suddenly to the most discouraged there came 
some fairies who said that on a given afternoon, 
to those who wished to assemble in a chosen field, 
a great golden ball, hung by a silver cord, would 
descend from the heavens. All who touched the 
golden disk would forever after have good health, 
happiness, and prosperity. 

"As may be imagined, all the people, whether 
well or ill, assembled in the great open place. 
Sure enough, at the stated time the beautiful 
golden disk was seen to descend. To those in 
the outskirts of the great assemblage it finally 
appeared low enough for any one to touch, but 
as with many really good things in life, it proved 
elusive even to those who were close to it. The 
tallest among the number could not reach it. 

"They struggled and crowded all afternoon. 
When it was near to twilight, and many were 
worn out, an old seer suggested that as none 
seemed able to touch the ball, why not take a 
little child out of its father's arms and, by form- 
ing a human pyramid, force it on their shoul- 
ders as high as possible? Perhaps the child 
could touch the disk, and it at least would have 
this coveted happiness and good cheer as long 
as it lived. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 173 

"No sooner said than done. The child was 
lifted high into the heavens. All were glad to 
help, and they joined in the human pyramid. 
And, as the tiny fingers touched the great disk, 
lo! a current, as though God-given, passed 
through the child, through those who held it, 
and on and out through the great multitude, even 
unto those who did not understand and were 
not actually touching. In the imselfish effort 
to help just one, the promised prosperity and 
good cheer descended to all. The place was 
called 'Peaceful Valley' forever after. "^ 

1 The above is the one and only article in Pro and Con that does not 
contain a reference to the game of golf. If_, however, some golfer 
may read it, and the lesson find a little room in his mind and heart, 
the space we give will not be wasted. 



Some golf experts are those who can 
take an obscure subject and by explana- 
tion make it still more obscure. 



CHAPTER XIV 
GOLF AND HEALTH 

GOLF is considered synonymous with health. 
Thousands of persons depend on the game 
to maintain their physical well being, and golf 
plays a serious part in the lives of many former 
invaHds. Dr. Wilbur L. Smith says: 

"Golf is not a 'fad' but a healthful sport, and 
will continue to be so indefinitely, because it has 
a solid, hygienic foimdation, that makes for per- 
manency; getting out of poorly ventilated offices 
and off of hard floors to the nice, soft turf — a great 
reHef to weak and tired foot arches and ankles — 
into the fresh air and sunshine, exercising all of 
the muscles and especially those along the spine, 
all tend to arouse sluggish circulation of the blood 
and the forces of life, which is so often the cause 
of retarded activities of the stomach, Hver, and 
intestinal tract. 

"The largest percentage of golfers is recruited 
from the ranks of business and professional men — 
those who usually lead sedentary lives and suffer 
most from 'stomach trouble.' How frequently 
you will hear one of these remarks, upon reaching 
the golf course, ' What a relief it is to get out here ! ' 
and the fundamental reason for the truth of that 
fact is easily derpcnstrated. 

"Most of the players of the 'royal and ancient' 
are those who are confined in offices and are more 

174 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 175 

or less subjected to close ranges of vision. The 
brain centers that control vision and the func- 
tional activities of the body are in close proximity, 
and a succession of strains of vision, automati- 
cally or reflexly, disturb the centers that control 
the heart, stomach, liver, and other organs, and 
a subnormal action is the effect. A noted eye 
specialist, giving the reason for so much relief 
secured by 'brain workers' from a sea voyage, 
or a trip to the mountains, states that it was ' due 
to the beneficial effects of long ranges of vision' 
and not entirely to change of diet, water, and 
fresh air. 

"With the average golf course all of these 
conditions that make for good health are com- 
bined, and in addition a man may become so 
interested in a close match that the cares of busi- 
ness can be temporarily laid aside, and what 
could be more soothing to the tired brain of a 
banker, jurist, minister, or business man than to 
be relieved of such burdens, if only for an after- 
noon? It is by reason of these factors if no other 
that the writer is convinced that golf is a good, 
permanent, and healthful sport and should be 
promoted by municipalities providing public 
courses, which, no doubt, would be productive of 
developing the futiu^e generation of business and 
professional men to a better physical plane, and 
do for this class of yoimg men what the public 
playgrounds are doing for children. 

"Don't overdo golf, and if you cannot stand 
the direct rays of the sun, be careful. 'Let not 



176 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

your zeal outride your judgment,' is a good pro- 
verb to follow — and when you begin to feel tired 
Nature is telling you to beware, and Nature is 
a good judge." 

DR. ELIOT ON ATHLETICS 

Dr. Eliot told the Harvard freshmen one day 
that golf was a game of benefit to mankind. 

"With the object of preserving a sound mind 
in a sound body, look ahead with regard to 
athletic sports," said Dr. Eliot. "It may make 
some difference to you in the next four years, 
perhaps, if you look ahead with regard to athletic 
sports. Under modem stresses athletic sports 
are an indispensable part of yoimg life, and, 
indeed, of sound national life. One of the most 
serious aspects of China at the present moment 
is the absence there of all the sports we call 
'athletic' Neither the educated nor the imedu- 
cated Chinese have athletic sports in the open 
air. All their sports are of a gambling nature. 
They are sedentary or quiet games of chance. 
That is a national misfortime on an immense 
scale. 

"By looking ahead in regard to athletic sports 
I mean give preference to those sports that last, 
and that you can pursue at thirty, forty, fifty, 
sixty, seventy, and, I am beginning to hope, at 
eighty years of age. You know what the lasting 
sports are — walking, golf, rowing, sailing a boat, 
tennis — any sport which can be pursued by the 
average individual all through life. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



177 



"Lord Bacon says that riding horseback is the 
best recreation for men who use their brains. 
The sports that an individual can pursue all 
through his life are the best ones to learn in 
youth. The wise choice involves looking ahead." 

KEEPING YOUNG 
GoK as a preventive of old age is prescribed by 
Dr. Aumont, himself an ardent golfer, and at one 




You can recognize 'em anywhere — even in citizens' clothes 



178 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

time a champion fencer. In a volume dedicated 
to Parisian society he asserts that it is quite 
unnecessary to grow old. Englishmen have 
solved the problem of keeping young by means 
of outdoor games, and if the gens du monde 
in France wish to preserve their youth, they 
should take to golf. 

"As a rule, when a Frenchman approaches 
fifty his doctor warns him to leave off alcohol, 
wine, and tobacco. He must also avoid fish and 
eat the smallest quantity of meat, and must 
banish pastry and coffee. He is also recom- 
mended to get up at six o'clock, walk at least 
two and a half miles a day, be douched and mas- 
saged after, and go to bed at nine. 

"This cheerless regime is condemned by Dr. 
Aumont, who in its place advocates as a sovereign 
remedy for gout, rheumatics, and kindred ail- 
ments the health-giving pastime of golf. It is 
good for the young and middle-aged of both 
sexes, and adapts itself to all constitutions and 
temperaments. It exercises all the limbs in a 
moderate manner, and deserves to be given the 
first place among commonsense and really hygi- 
enic sports. The doctor's credo may be summed 
up in these words : ' If you would keep young, do 
not diet yourself, but eat and drink moderately, 
sleep seven hours, and play golf.'" 

BASEBALL AND GOLF 

Heine Zimmerman, of the Cubs National 
League baseball team, recently the leading 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 179 

batter, says practice on the links puts him in 
good physical trim and helps his batting eye. 
In a recent article he said: 

"Give me three weeks' time, any spring, on a 
golf links, and I '11 be ready for the big bell in April. 
That line may be misleading to the average fan 
who thinks a baseball player must jirmp right 
in after a winter of idleness and start training 
just as a jockey, boxer, or Marathon runner. 
Some plaj^ers do require this sort of preliminary 
conditioning. I don't. 

"To my way of thinking golf is a great exercise 
for strengthening the legs and arms and for 
sharpening the batting eye. Much as I like 
baseball, I'm always right at home whenever 
I'm given the freedom of a links, for it was as a 
caddie at the Westchester Golf Club, ten years 
ago, that I learned the game. I really believe 
the experience and training I had from daily 
practice with the clubs owned by wealthy members 
played a prominent part in fitting me for big- 
league hitting. 

"Travis, Vardon, and Brokaw were frequent 
visitors to the Hnks when I was employed there, 
and I carried the clubs on several occasions for 
Mr. Travis when he was engaged in championship 
matches. Every day I would study his style 
of golfing, and at the first opportunity, while 
waiting for a job, I'd sneak out on the greens 
and practice driving and approaching iron shots 
and putts. I remember one tournament in which 
the caddies of Westchester, of which I later was 



i8o PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

given the commanding position, held a special 
tournament with the boys from the Van Cortlandt 
links. We gave them an unmerciful trimming. 
I think I hit about .457 in that tournament. 

"On my team I had about all the members 
of our family that could consistently get away 
from home. There was Will, who played second 
base this season for Frankfort of the Blue Grass 
League; Arthur, a semiprofessional about New 
York, and two other brothers, Gus and George. 
Take it from me we gave the Van Cortlandt 
lads a swell lacing. All my brothers, including 
two more, Paul and Rudolph, are plumbers by 
trade, and I worked that line for two years. 

"I noticed one thing in particular, that the 
more I played golf the stronger my arms and 
shoulders grew, and I acquired an easy, free 
swing, something that later helped me a whole 
lot while batting. Any one who has failed three 
or four times in his first effort at the tee will tell 
you that it takes keen eyesight to strike the little 
white ball properly and with the force necessary 
to drive it a long distance. That part of the game 
was my middle name, and I got to be a whale of 
a hitter once I found the proper gauge. So in 
this respect the game is beneficial and a lot of 
assistance in toning up the batting eyes. 

"The long hikes taken daily by the enthusiastic 
golfer, who never tires even though he plays three 
or four matches a day, are bound to strengthen 
the legs and send the player home with a ravenous 
appetite. Believe me, golf isn't the old ladies' 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



iSl 



game that it is generally considered to be by 
folks who never indulge in it. 

"Four trips a day used to be my speed, lugging 
six or seven golf bags, an approximate weight of 
fifty-five potmds. For that I usually was paid 
a dollar and a half, or sometimes two dollars and 
a half, according to the liberality of my clients. 
For two years I was an ordinary, able caddie, then 
I drew a promotion and was made head caddie. 
The next two years I taught green players and 
charged one dollar a lesson, oftentimes making 
as high as forty dollars a week. My side line 
consisted of superintending a boathouse, where I 
rented rowboats to folks who wanted exercise on 
the Bronx creek. 

"The caddies had several bloody ball games, 
the kind of games in which we would choose sides, 
and I soon drifted to the Bronx Athletics, one of 
the strong semiprofessional clubs of New York. 
Later I joined the Riverlawn Baseball Club and 
also picked up a lot of easy money playing the 
infield for the Cedars. One summer when the 
Fordham College team went to Red Hook, New 
York, for a series of games I decided to accompany 
them, and it was while a member of that club 
that I was sighted by Jim Robinson and sent to 
the Wilkesbarre Club of the New York State 
League. 

"Only two and one-half years before I was 
doing a trick as caddie at the Westchester club. 
My first season with Wilkesbarre was a howling 
success. At least I thought so, for I batted .340, 



i82 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

and after one year in the minors was recoih- 
mended by Johnny Evers and sold to the Chicago 
Cubs. 

"Now I would n't have the nerve to come out 
flatfooted and say that any ball player who can 
hit ought to make a good golfer, or that a cracker- 
jack golfer, such as 'Chick' Evans, Harold 
Hilton, Jerome Travers, Walter Travis, or Paul 
Himter would be equally at home swinging at 
the pitching of Nap Rucker, Christy Mathewson, 
Ed Walsh, or Walter Johnson." 



A girl can't throw a golf ball straight, but 
that is no reason why she should n't have an 
aim in life. 



CHAPTER XV 
ROCKEFELLER AND GOLF 

Who says I'm old? 
I'm twenty to-day. 

WHO shall say that this may not have been 
the Httle refrain that ran through the head 
of John D. Rockefeller when on a recent birthday 
the Standard Oil magnate played the best game 
of golf of his career on the links at Pocantico Hills, 
traversing the nine-hole links in forty-three? 
The performance was considered of such impor- 
tance — because the keen devotee of the game 
had taken care to tell his interviewers that he 
had accomplished a better round than he had 
ever made, either in summer or winter — that it 
was sent broadcast through the medium of the 
press reports not only in the United States but 
abroad. 

With his face aglow with good spirits — he 
constantly taps the fountain of bonhomie when 
permitted to play a game of golf — the septua- 
genarian came in from his round on his own 
Hnks, accepting, like a child who had succeeded 
in flying a kite, the congratulations of those who 
were enjoying the hospitality of the links. Then 
he declared that it seemed to him he was growing 
younger rather than older. 

"You know, I have been a keen devotee of 
this game for several years," Mr. Rockefeller 

183 
13 



1 84 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

said to a friend, "and I think that golf and 
outdoor life in the automobile have made me 
many years younger than I otherwise might 
have been." 

Many will recall the thrills that were expe- 
rienced several years ago when, upon the occasion 
of Mr. John D. Rockefeller's birthday anni- 
versary, he trudged around behind D. E. Sawyer 
of the Wheaton Golf Club, one of the best expo- 
nents of the game I have ever seen, and Walter 
J. Travis, the "Grand Old Man of Golf" (and 
not so old at that) , in their respective matches at 
the Euclid Club's links, near Cleveland. During 
the first match round of the National Golf 
Association amateur championship the oil mag- 
nate descanted upon the game of golf and what it 
had done for his health. 

As I recall it, Mr. Rockefeller expressed a 
desire to become acquainted with Mr. Sawyer. 

"His eye is bright and he looks hke a mighty 
clever golfer," said Mr. Rockefeller. 

Then, upon being introduced, Mr. Rockefeller 
felt of Mr. Sawyer's sinewy arm and laughingly 
remarked, "I think that arm might help to 
outdrive me." Still, Mr. Rockefeller at that time 
weighed close to one himdred and eighty pounds 
and confessed that he had been able to average 
more than one hundred and seventy yards on his 
drives. 

"Play plenty of golf — be out in the open every 
hour you can spare on the links," was one of the 
oil king's remarks that day. His epigrams and 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 185 

maxims were taken down by a score or more of 
eager newspaper men anxious to punctuate their 
stories of the Rockefeller birthday with matters 
of interest. 

Despite the heat and the dust that day, Mr. 
Rockefeller insisted upon trudging after certain 
matches. He had to divest himself of his coat, 
and he carried it as handily over his arm as the 
reporters who accompanied him carried theirs. 

Did some of the newspaper men long for the 
shade of the grill room at the club, with a tall 
glass of some ice-cold drink on the table before 
them ? I think they did. But they did not dare 
lose track of Mr. Rockefeller for an instant. He 
was good "copy" that day. They grinned, bore 
up with the heat and dust, and were ashamed to 
let it be known that a man sixty-eight years 
young could climb the slippery, sim-baked grades 
and traverse the scorched fair-greens — ttimed 
brown, most of them — without wilting his 
collar or losing his equanimity. Mr. Rockefeller 
took good care of his trousers — had them rolled 
up by a Chicago newspaper man who was cour- 
teous enough to keep him from bending over — 
and good naturedly remarked that if the dust 
spoiled his stockings he could get a new pair 
when he got home. 

There was considerable improvement work 
being done in the neighborhood of the Euclid 
links at the time, and a railroad grade was being 
run right through a portion of the course. It 
formed an interesting hazard, for it was liberally 



1 86 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

supplied with crushed limestone and broken 
stone not unlike that used extensively as a 
roadbed dressing for the great trunk lines. Mr, 
Travis sent his ball right into a network of steel 
rails and ties, and while he was studying how to 
play out without breaking his dub, Mr. Rocke- 
feller from his place of vantage on the side of 
the right of way cautioned his friends to remain 
silent. 

"I like to see a great wizard of the game of 
golf like Mr. Travis study out a shot that would 
be too much of a puzzle for me," he said. 

After the Garden City veteran had played out 
without breaking his mashie, Mr. Rockefeller 
led the applause, clapping his hands for two 
minutes. 

Let those who wish, criticize Mr. Rockefeller; 
others may praise him. His love for the good old 
game of golf and the spirit of enthusiasm he has 
shown when climbing over the hills, watching a 
good or a bad shot, indicate a kindred spirit cer- 
tainly with all golfers, and also with all human 
kind. 

And may it not be possible that the kindly 
thought for many in the splendid gifts to uni- 
versities, hospitals, and other charities found 
their birth in his great brain out on the golf 
links, under the clear sky in Nature's own hall 
of the universe, perhaps while the little white 
ball, humming through space from his brassie, 
had gone so far and so wild that it was impossible 
to find it the same day? 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 187 

A GREAT PAIR 

Mr. Rockefeller has told a story of an experience 
he had with a caddie, and although the joke was 
on him, he laughed heartily in telling it. 

One morning Mr. Rockefeller's regular caddie 
was ill and he sent a substitute. Just to have 
fim with the boy, Mr. Rockefeller asked him 
how to make a stroke, in what direction to drive, 
and similar questions. The boy was eager to 
instruct, and Mr. Rockefeller made a fine drive. 
Again the boy pointed the way, and Mr. Rocke- 
feller made a clean drive to the green. 

As the caddie saw the ball roll on the green, he 
turned to Mr. Rockefeller and said: "Say, Mister, 
if you had my brains and I had your strength, 
what a great pair we would make." 



Some money is accumulated at too great 
a loss, by those who do not play golf. 



CHAPTER XVI 
WHAT CONSTITUTES A REAL GOLFER 

A GOLFER'S conduct on the field has much 
to do with his own success as well as the 
well-being of his club. It takes many to make a 
good club, and the real golfer is one who respects 
that rule. The following paragraphs are from 
a small pamphlet of advice on "What Constitutes 
a Real Golfer": 

"A real golfer is a gentleman, and only a gen- 
tleman can become a real golfer. 

"The real golfer replaces all divots. He has 
the interest of the entire membership at heart. 
He is the first one to invoke the rules against 
himself. He gives rather than takes. He never 
forces his opponent to the embarrassment of 
calling his attention to a violation of the rules. 

"When he loses a ball he immediately signals 
the match following to pass through — and really 
allows them to pass through and out of range 
before he resimies play. 

"The golf player who is not a real golfer is 
the one who never signals the players behind 
to pass through, or who finds his ball after the 
match following has started to go through, and 
then resumes play, much to the congestion of the 
course, and the discomfiture of the players pass- 
ing through. 

"The real golfer never figures up his score on 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 189 

the putting-green. He moves off immediately 
after holing out. He never takes practice shots 
when players following are waiting. He always 
gives way to the match behind when it is apparent 
that the match following is being held back. 

"He never stands close to or directly behind 
the ball, nor moves nor talks when a player 
is making a stroke. On the putting-green he 
does not stand beyond the hole in the line of 
a player's stroke. 

"The real golfer, likewise, allows the player, 
who has the honor, to play before teeing his own 
ball. He does not play from the tee until the 
party in front have played their second strokes 
and are out of range, nor does he play up to the 
putting-green imtil the party in front have holed 
out and moved away. 

"He replaces and presses down the turf he 
may have cut or displaced; he carefully fills up 
all holes made by himself in a bunker, and he sees 
to it that his caddie does not injure the holes by 
standing close to them when the ground is soft. 

"When he incurs a penalty stroke he intimates 
the fact to his opponent as soon as possible. 

"The real golfer will do anything to help relieve 
•the congestion of the course. He will keep up 
with the match ahead or give way to the match 
behind. If the match ahead is not keeping its 
place, and is holding him back and causing him 
to hold back others, he will politely call the 
attention of the match ahead to this fact and 
request permission to go through. 



I go PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"The real golfer never resents having his atten- 
tion called to the fact that he is not holding his 
place on the course. Neither does he resent being 
requested to allow a match to go through either 
for this reason, or because of a lost ball. He will 
anticipate the request and insist that the match 
pass through. 

"After all, the real golfer is just a gentleman 
who has the greatest consideration for his fellow- 
players." 

THE EDUCATION OF A GOLFER 

Education will play a big part in perfecting 
the beginner in the game of golf. On this subject 
Eleanor E. Helme, recent English internation- 
alist, has to say: 

"Education sounds a dry word by which to 
describe the himdred and one happenings more 
or less pleasurable whose combined influence 
turn out the finished golfer, but at least it is a 
wide term in these days, and so well applicable 
to a process which should be never-ending in a 
golfing career. For at golf, as at things more 
vital, textbooks, teachers, and an early start 
upon the right road are all very desirable and 
necessary, but the real learning begins when such 
foundations have been laid and done with. 

"Having learned to go 'slow back and keep the 
eye on the ball ' ; to hit that same refractory rub- 
ber-core with something approaching regularity 
not far from the center of the club; to get over 
any reasonable carry not exceeding one hundred 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 191 

and forty yards; to hole at least ninety per cent 
of the yard putts; to keep a serene face under 
victory or defeat — the golfer who has accom- 
plished this has gone a certain distance in the 
right direction. Incidentally she will probably 
have reduced her handicap well down into single 
figures, and acquired a very fair working knowl- 
edge of the game, but these rudiments are merely 
the reading, 'riting, and 'rithmetic of golf, and 
the tug-of-war comes when something further 
must be added to put life into the technique and 
stamina into that life. 

"Probably the first branch of the higher educa- 
tion to be attacked shotild be the problem pre- 
sented by a small portion of cardboard and pencil 
slipped into the pocket for the express purpose 
of recording every shot, good, bad, or indifferent, 
perpetrated by the player. Not that medal win- 
ning need be the ultimate goal; many an erratic 
scorer finds consolation in the reflection that, after 
all, the internationals and championship are 
match play affairs. But because nothing except 
the unrelenting record in black and white brings 
home to the player how many mistakes she has 
made, even though a few clean drives and crisp 
iron shots have given a general impression of good 
play. To realize shortcomings is the first step 
toward working their remedy, and a card and 
pencil once or twice a week act as a wondrous 
tonic to the golfing system, particularly by reason 
of their insistence on the value of averaging two 
putts or less on each green. 



192 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



"Then comes a period when team or foursome 
play is the best education, giving pause to the 




A study in youthful strength and form 

most thoughtless of slashers, teaching her to 
play steady, thoughtful golf, and to grow used to 
a sense of responsibility. It does not greatly 
matter what the event may be, once the element 
of playing for a side is present, the sobering in- 
fluence begins to work its beneficial way. With 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 193 

team matches come visits to other courses, and a 
resultant abiHty to judge strange distances and 
to acquire fresh shots; then, too, perhaps there 
are encounters with or against the best players 
for the first time, and the stimulus consequent on 
a wish to imitate their game. 

"Next comes the inclusion in the coimty team, 
and then at last the first championship, with all 
its hopes, disappointments, enthusiasm, and 
excitement. Perhaps a veil will need to be drawn 
over personal performances therein; it is a nervous 
occasion, and the debutante probably fails to do 
herself justice, but she learns many things — that 
the best even of the first-class players are ex- 
tremely human, and can make the most cardinal 
of errors, but that they have a power of recovery 
and of producing their supreme effort at the 
critical moment quite outside the calculations of 
the humble handicap player. The novice realizes, 
possibly for the first time, what wonders may be 
worked by a placid temperament and a deter- 
mination which refuses to acknowledge defeat, 
and how large a part of golf is mental rather than 
actual. Lastly, she inevitably learns that an 
accurate short game is worth all the hard hitting 
in the world. 

"Our learner goes home sadder and wiser, but 
she is a championship competitor now, the spell 
is upon her; by hook or by crook she will get her 
name on to that magic gray time sheet each suc- 
ceeding year, and as time goes by she may creep 
farther along it into the select band of 'last 



194 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

sixteen,' 'last eight' or even 'medallist.' There 
will be some relapses, a few falls, but she is on 
the high road, and the golfer of the right tem- 
perament learns by her mistakes. Opinions differ 
as to the most educational occurrence in golf. 
Perhaps the view is near the truth which asserts 
that there is nothing so bracing in effect as a 
sound and convincing defeat from an opponent 
of whom the player has taken little account. 
Certainly, it is a humiliating experience which 
pushes the struggler forcibly from the rung of 
the golfing ladder where she has temporarily 
come to rest. If she be young and optimistic the 
apt pupil sees to it that her next resting place is 
the rung above that which she has just vacated, 
no matter though the higher she goes the wider 
apart are the rungs set, for it is so much harder 
for the scratch player to improve than the player 
whose handicap runs to double figures. 

" However, when a player has attained a certain 
pitch, her golfing perceptions are quicker, and 
she gains inspiration from all manner of tri- 
fling occurrences. Textbooks and teachers have 
played their part ; now her best mentor is a faith- 
ful golfing diary compiled under the light of rigid 
self-examination when the round is over. A little 
knowledge is only dangerous if it sees no need of 
becoming more, and the golfer who is always on 
the lookout for crumbs of information and help 
will never lack for hints or interest from the most 
himible source. Even a twenty-four handicap 
may have some useful scrap of golfing philosophy 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 195 

to offer to her happier sister of the low handicap 
or scratch standard." 

"THE START AND THE FINISH" 

"There are several things to be considered in 
match play which influence us in regard to 
whether we are to adopt the course of a 'win- 
ning,' a ding-dong, or an up-hill game," says 
Stephen Armstrong in the Christian Science 
Monitor. "If your opponent in the first is one 
v/ho has the reputation of getting discouraged you 
naturally decide to get ahead as much as possible 
and make it a runaway match. If on the con- 
trary he is likely to make a brilliant finish you 
must play the steady game, watching for his 
special effort toward the end. 

" It is not often we get the same advice for two 
opposite courses, but in all golf games play as 
hard as you can from the start to the finish. 
This applies in a medal round, and doubly so in 
all kinds of match play where it is not so apparent 
to most people. Because So-and-So lost after 
being five up, nine times out of ten is not due to 
the fact that he wore himself out, but because 
he felt the game was won and slackened with the 
corresponding encouragement to his opponent to 
make a spurt and pull down the lead. This in 
turn alarmed So-and-So as it slipped away that 
he lost his head and threw away the match. 
What he should have done when five up was to 
make it six up as soon as possible. 

"To lose a match after having a big lead, or to 



196 ' PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

come near losing it, as Hilton did, is a very trying 
experience, and if the latter happens in the mid- 
dle of a tournament one is very likely to lose in 
the next round to an inferior player. Remember, 
then, never slacken, especially when you have a 
big lead. ' 

"Two instances in championships proved this. 
On one occasion A was two up and had a four- 
inch putt for the match at the sixteenth. Care- 
lessness resulted in the ball not going down, 
and annoyance at such stupidity made A play 
wildly at the next, so that B was only one down 
going to the home hole. It needed a great deal 
of head work for A to get control to play the 
last hole well enough to get a half. It is a lesson 
not soon forgotten. 

"In another case one player was six up and 
eight to go and lost on the last green, through a 
brilliant streak of approaching and putting on the 
opponent's part, which made the player feel all 
was useless near the greens, unless the other was 
playing two more. This was the opposite fault 
to slackening and one qmte as fatal: pressing. 
You don't need to press when you play hard. 
Keep within your game but play as well as you 
can, and if you show no signs of slackening the 
chances are the expected spurt will never be 

made." 

THE RIGHT SPIRIT 

J. L. Low in The Golfers' Year Book says: 

"And after all, it is in the nature of a great 

game that a sharp crisis should occur and a thing 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 197 

be done once for all, either for good or evil. In 
life we may try to fix the penalties to suit the 
crimes, but in a game we must try to make our 
crimes evade the already fixed penalties. It is 
not for nothing that the pool balls have different 
values according to their color; nor does it escape 
the notice of the onlooker that the better players 
more frequently succeed when the greater risks 
are at stake. At cricket we sometimes see a 
master hand playing straight balls across the 
wicket ; he is taking big risks in order to reap rich 
gain. But this idea of doing away with the 
greatest risks seems to me to take much of the 
sport and bigness out of golf; in the old days what 
a hero the man was who went for 'the station 
master's garden'; to-day I try it myself unless 
the match is very nearly contested. Nerve and 
judgment should be good qualities in the golfer. 
How can they be better demonstrated than by 
asking him either to risk or avoid the greatest 
danger?" 

"I SHOULD WORRY" 

"Never give up a hole. Neither hole nor game 
is lost until it 's won, and there is much philosophy 
in the advice of the old Scots caddie: 'Gi'e up 
the hole, is it? Na! na! Wha' kens but yon 
man '11 drap doon deid before ye get to the hole ? ' 

"Never concede short putts. Remember that 
he gives twice who gives quickly, and that, con- 
ceding a half, you may be throwing away the 
(w)hole. 



igS PRO AND CON OP GOLF 

"Never be ashamed to return your card. A 
player once won a bogey competition with eighteen 
down. Everybody else had torn up his card." 

A GOLF LESSON 

Do not sulk, growl, or be envious when you see 
the old man go out to play golf. 

He has earned the right, if his professional or 
business organization is good. 

He is giving some one — perhaps you — an excel- 
lent opportunity to develop ability. 

Your cue, and that of others down the line, is 
to show him the organization can get along with- 
out him. 

Admit, if it cannot do so, the old man had better 
get another organization, or give up golf. 

If the former, there should be no bouquets 
pinned on any one, old man not excepted. 

A spray of spinach should take the place of 
roses. 



He knows the least who "knows it all.^' 



CHAPTER XVII 
RULES OF GOLF 

THE rules of golf are so numerous and varied 
that infringements even by the most expert 
players are common. Bernard Thomas con- 
tributes a series of articles to Ladies' Golf dealing 
with the common blunders in observance of the 
rules. He says: " It is safe to assert that not one 
golfer in ten could answer correctly a paper 
containing half a dozen elementary questions on 
the rules of golf. If a little qualifying examina- 
tion of this sort could be imposed on the com- 
petitors for monthly medals and sweeps before 
the spoils were handed over, then indeed would 
the poor secretary come into his own, for he 
would often be the sole surviA^or of the ordeal. 
The secretary is, of course, the only person who 
is expected to know the law; for is it not one 
of his duties to answer offhand all questions on 
the rules and thus save his members the trouble 
of reading them? 

"It is given to few of us to be scratch players, 
but there is no reason why we should not all 
acquire a sound knowledge of the rules and of 
the best traditions of the game. It is a mistake 
to suppose that great golfing ability necessarily 
implies a sound knowledge of the rules. The 
thoroughly incompetent player enjoys exceptional 
facilities for the study of the rules, and greater 

199 

14 



200 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

wisdom in the law is often found among long 
handicap players than among the elect, who by 
the dull monotony of their own good play miss 
that practical training in the law afforded to the 
weaker players by the vicissitudes they experience 
during an ordinary round of the course. The 
bad player learns the law in the stem school of 
experience; his daily roimd yields the nucleus of a 
splendid practice in golfing law. I speak of 
course not of the novice but of the seasoned long 
handicap player — the backbone of every club — 
the player who, month after month, swells the 
pool of the winners of competitions. As the late 
H. S. C. Everard wrote many years ago, 'It is a 
singular thing that there is no game known into 
which the tyro will more confidently plunge 
without the most elementary acquaintance with 
its laws than this very game of golf.' Un- 
doubtedly the laws are of some complexity and 
not to be taken in hand lightly or learned by a 
single reading, and it seems to me fitting and 
proper that a great game, played imder such an 
infinite variety of circimistances, should have 
laws that call for some serious study on the part 
of those who aspire to know that game. 

"One thing has always astonished me, and 
that is the simple, childlike faith with which so 
many players accept as authoritative whatever 
their club professional tells them with regard to 
the rules. It is hardly to be expected that the 
professional (much less the better informed 
caddie), when appealed to on some more or less 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 201 

abstruse point, is going to say that he doesn't 
know. Ever obliging, he answers by the 'pure 
light of reason,' and is generally hopelessly wrong. 
It does not seem to occur to a certain class of 
players to consult the rules of golf in their original 
language. The average professional, good fellow 
though he is, is by no means an authority on the 
rules of golf; indeed, he would be the last to make 
such a claim. Many professionals have not yet 
grasped the essential differences between the 
present code and that which was in force when 
some of them were small caddies. But it should 
be said for the professional that he but seldom has 
occasion to apply the rules that our legislators 
have foimd it necessary to make for dealing with 
the strange situations that arise during a round 
by the ordinary, foozling club player; he could n't 
play badly enough! 

" One of the pleasantest features of professional 
play is the complete absence of grumbles about 
'hard times' and appeals of the 'what-can-I-do- 
here?' type. In fact, questions as to the rules 
simply don't arise in their sort of golf. If a 
professional is in a doubtful place he merely 
plays out of it as quickly as possible. He does 
not waste time arguing whether he can lift. 
Generally speaking, the professional plays the 
game in a better spirit than does the amateur, 
and so far as the professional is concerned the 
rules might well be condensed to that one beautiful 
underlying principle — the baU must be played 
wherever it lies." 



202 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

WINTER RULES 

In view of the fact that winter play in the north- 
em and eastern portions of the United States 
is becoming more and more a feature, would it 
not be wise to have local rules relating thereto 
in every club ? 

Where there are threesomes, foursomes, five- 
somes, and sixsomes that start out, a certain 
value would come in having the ordinary state- 
ment, "Let us play winter rules," somewhat 
defined. It is discovered during the match, or 
after the play is over, that some of the players 
were not playing according to the same rules. 
In other words, the rules were merely verbal, 
with no general understanding. 

For example, if it were understood in any 
given club that between the first of December 
and the first of April 

Balls lying in fair-green may be placed. 

Balls in the rough may not be placed, or, on the 
other hand, if desired, the rule might allow placing. 

BaUs in a bunker may be moved out of heel prints 
and depressions, but only quite near to the place 
where the ball stopped, and must not be teed unless 
the sand is frozen. 

A ball in water, snow, or ice in a bunker could 
be replaced to a dry spot in the bunker, on the same 
line of distance from the hole, or if there be no dry 
spot on that line, then to the nearest dry spot that 
would give a fair or flat lie and a stance. 

If the entire bunker be water, or wet and mushy 
sand, then, at the option of the player, the ball could 
be lifted back on fair-green for the loss of a stroke. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF J03 

A ball in a bad place at the angle of the sand and 
cop in a bunker, could only be moved to a better 
part of the same angle. The stance must not be 
improved, excepting the ball lying in water. 

Ball may be cleared of mud at any part of field or 
green, etc., etc. 

There is enough here to make the average 
player see the advantage of rules which may be 
applied during the winter. 

A slight deviation from rules tmder which all 
are playing for the first three or foiu* holes, 
until the matter were discovered and corrected, 
might make a considerable difference in the 
game. Sometimes one will go through an entire 
game without discovering that he has been at a 
disadvantage, or perhaps had the advantage in 
the play. 

No expense need be made in printing or 
mailing such niles unless it is profitable to do so. 
They might be typewritten and placed on the 
wall or board in some portion of the club most 
popular during the time selected as the "winter- 
rule period" on any given course. 

GOOD FORM 

Walter J. Travis has written an excellent 
article on "Departmental Ethics": 

"There are certain men whom it is hard to 
play against, not so much on account of their 
personality, although that at all times is indeed 
a big factor, but more largely by reason of their 



204 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

offending against the canons of, let us say, good 
form," Mr. Travis says. "Now we cannot but 
believe that most of these sins of commission, or 
omission, are committed unwittingly. 

"Some men are so constituted that it is difficult 
for them to enter into the feelings of their more 
finely-strung opponents, which usually means the 
latter's undoing, or at aU events, failture to do 
justice to their game. 

"There are, however, certain elementary rules 
of conduct which should always be observed, 
and any failure to live up to them ought to be 
visited with a penalty of loss of the hole, or 
certainly of a stroke. 

"Let us endeavor to put down a few of the 
more salient: 

"(i) The first and most important duty of 
a player toward his opponent is to obliterate 
himseh when the latter is preparing to, or making 
a stroke. By which we mean to say that the 
player should efface himself — put himself quite 
out of range of vision. This should be done, 
anticipatively. Don't wait to be asked. 

"(2) When your opponent is in possession 
of the teeing-ground, no matter whether you 
have driven or not, don't indulge in either 
preliminary or subsequent swings. 

"(3) When yotu" opponent is on the put- 
ting-green and it is his play, keep absolutely 
quiet. Don't walk up and down your line of 
putt, removing this or that impediment. Wait, 
considerately; your turn will come. 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 205 

"(4) If your opponent has a short putt, no 
matter whether it be for a win or a half, do or say 
nothing to indicate that you had intended con- 
ceding it but had changed your mind, suggesting 
the possibiUty of a miss. Either allow it or keep 
quiet. Never, in any circumstances, say, 'I'll 
have to ask you to putt that,' or ' I don't suppose 
you can miss it,' or, 'I 've seen shorter putts than 
that missed.' 

"(s) Refrain from remarks concerning your 
opponent's game generally, or of isolated shots, 
unless the latter be of exceptional merit, or very 
harshly treated. Keep all this, generally speak- 
ing, until the match is over. 

"(6) Never walk along or across your oppo- 
nent's line of putt, and try also to educate your 
caddie accordingly. 

"(7) If your opponent loses his ball, assist, 
with yotu" caddie, in its search; and if there be a 
'gallery,' enlist their aid as well. 

" (8) Endeavor to make your shot without any 
unnecessary delay or fussiness. The really good 
players play quickly, and you are only handicap- 
ping yourself in burning up time. 

" (9) Never say anything to distract the 
mind of your opponent, as, for instance, when he 
has the honor on say a pond hole, ' It woiild be a 
crime to disttirb the placidity of that water's 
surface,' or remarks of kindred ilk. 

" (10) Don't walk ahead of your opponent 
before he has made his shot, nor allow your 
caddie to do so. 



2o6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"(ii) Try to be a good winner, or, more 
important still, a good loser. 

"Now all this concerns your relations toward 
yotir opponent. But never forget that ' there are 
others.' And you owe a duty, duties we shotild 
say, to them. To wit: 

"(a) Do not shout or give expression to any 
undue hilarity, as a result of any stroke. Remem- 
ber that this may disturb other players. 

"(b) If your match should lose a baU, signal 
the following match to go through. And when 
this is done do not play a single stroke tuitil they 
have holed out or are out of range, even if the 
ball be found immediately after signaling. 

" (c) While, imder the rules, a single has the 
right to go through a three- or four-ball match, 
it is not always considerate to exercise the 
privilege, especially on a crowded course and 
when the match ahead, a three- or four-baller, is 
keeping its place on the green. 

" (d) If you are engaged in any kind of match, 
and are hopelessly out of it, pick up your ball. 

" (e) If your opponent gives up the hole do not 
waste time in holing out. 

" (/) Do not try and combine both match and 
medal play. 

"(g) In no circumstances, on a crowded 
course, should individual matches be played in a 
three- or four-baller. 

"(h) Individual medal play should be abso- 
lutely tabooed in three or four-ball matches. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 207 

"(i) Never fail to fill up heelmarks or holes 
made by yourself in a bunker. 

" (;') Don't clamber out of a bimker up the face. 
It is imdignified; besides, it hurts the bunker. 

"Now, while we have not dwelt upon the 
recognized ' Etiquette of Golf ' which is printed in 
all books covering the rules, yet it must not be 
understood that we are not heartily in favor of 
their strict observance. We have rather en- 
deavored to touch upon those things which are not 
embraced in the regular code, which, nevertheless, 
are of vital importance. 

"As to your caddie, if he is a good one, encour- 
age him by a few words of commendation at the 
end of the round. If he is a poor one, don't 
'bull3a"ag' him, but try to educate him to be a 
better one. Finally, never forget it is a gentle- 
man's game." 

INDOOR GOLF 

Indoor golf is rapidly becoming a most popular 
indoor sport. Not only is it a means of keeping 
members and guests, most of whom are golf 
players and golf lovers, interested, inasmuch as 
the game is played as near Hke the outdoor game 
as possible, but it enables players to practice and 
to keep their game up during the days when golf 
is impracticable on the Unks. It keeps players in 
good physical condition, as the exercise is rational. 
Good form also is held only by practice. Tourna- 
ments can be held and arrangements easily made 
with instructors for lessons. 



2o8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

The complete outfit consists of a back canvas, 
which is divided into nine pockets, side and 
ceiling nets, a putting-green carpet, a driving 
board and standing mat, blackboard and eraser, 
and the necessary rule cards. 

The pockets are marked with different figures 
showing the length a ball is driven according to 
club used and the direction and strength of the 
shot played. The pockets in the center are 
marked a longer distance than the pockets to 
the right and left. It can be readily understood 
that a ball poorly hit with a tendency to either 
slice or pull will go to a side pocket and not as 
far as a straight, well-hit ball that will reach the 
center pockets. 

A space slightly larger than the size of the 
canvas is necessary within which to play the game. 
These canvases and nets are very easily installed. 

The game is played as follows: Suppose the 
first hole of your golf course is two hundred and 
eighty-five yards. The first player drives, and 
if he reaches the center pocket he has made a 
two-hundred-yard drive and has eighty-five 
yards to go. The bottom pocket to the left 
shows an eighty-five-yard mashie shot. If the 
player pitches into this pocket on his next shot, 
he is considered on the green and is entitled to a 
fifteen-foot putt for a three ; if, however, he plays 
into a pocket other than the one he is playing 
for, he would be over or short according to the 
distance marked on that pocket. He then 
pitches to any pocket, and whichever one he 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 209 

reaches is entitled to the putt marked. He is 
then putting for a four. If he holes out he is 
credited with a four, but if he misses and goes 
down on his next putt he gets a five. 
- You will understand that the shots are played 
almost as out of doors and with the same strength. 
The next player then proceeds to play the hole, 
and the scores are marked on the blackboard 
just as a score card is used in the outdoor game. 
Any golf course desired may be played. 

While the game may be arranged for private 
use, still there is an establishment in Chicago 
with five nets in operation. They are in constant 
use throughout the day and evening, to ac- 
commodate those who know the value. These are 
made up largely of business and professional men 
and also of many ladies of Chicago and vicinity. 
The managers give lessons each day to experi- 
enced players and also to novices. 

Also, there is a very interesting article known 
as golfers' putting disks. Many of these disks 
are in use all over the country. One or more may 
be placed on strips of carpet at irregular distances 
and a small putting course arranged in a very 
small space. 

COMMON COURTESY 

The following from the club book issued by the 
Lakewood Coimtry Club of Denver, Colorado, is 
valuable: 

"Conversation is the most useless feature of a 
game. The story of what you did and did not do 



210 PRO AND CON OP GOLF 

has little or no interest for your competitor. 
Such relief as you may derive from it between 
shots may be tolerated, but it can be dispensed 
with, and if it proceeds so far as to take his atten- 
tion from his own game, it is odious and strains 
the limits- of friendship. Talking while another 
player is studying his shot is criminal, and any 
noise or movement on your part while he is in the 
act of putting deserves instant death. 

"As a matter of good sportsmanship, play 
yoitr ball as it lies unless you know there is a 
rule saying you can move in. 

"As a matter of justice to other members, 
please do not overpay your caddie. Every 
player knows the inevitable result of such a 
practice. Every good boy is satisfied with what 
he earns legitimately, and if you will give him 
praise when he deserves it you will do him more 
good than by overpa3ang him. A kind word 
hurts nobody. 

"Be fair with your caddie in the matter of 
criticizing his shortcomings. Caddies are chil- 
dren, as a rule, and should be treated as such. 
If you scold him, do so with a view to improving 
his work, not to relieve your own feelings. You 
can't expect him to keep his eye on the ball con- 
stantly in its flight into the unbeaten rough, when 
you can't keep your own eye on it while it stands 
still before you. 

"A round of golf is a test of character. You 
know a man pretty well after eighteen holes. 

" If you must tell your partner why you slipped 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 211 

up on a certain shot, hold it until you get to the 
nineteenth. What does he care? He has trou- 
bles of his own, and is trying manfully to contain 
them. 

"The most important period in golf is the first 
dozen rounds. Habits acquired then will stick to 
you as long as you play the game. Therefore, 
take lessons from the professional until you can 
copy his swing — get 'form.' After that it is all a 
matter of practice and the use of your intelligence. 

"A player who sees another violating the rules 
of play should remind him of it, and the player 
so reminded should accept the warning in a spirit 
of loyalty to fair sport, which demands that the 
rules be strictly enforced." 

SHARP PRACTICE 

' ' The nursing of handicaps, the subtle improving 
of hes, the thousand and one little things that may 
be done out of an opponent's sight, are all in- 
cluded in the category of sharp practices. But 
there are other faults nearly as bad, such as 
feeling depressed on playing badly, complaints 
about one's opponent's luck and one's own ill 
luck, and too much 'swelled head' when some- 
thing good has been done, 'Swelled head' is, 
iinfortimately, rather a failing among young 
golfers, but it dies with more experience." 

GOLF DONT'S FOR THE DUFFER 

The following golf dont's are by "Niblicking," 
whose putts along the Hne of advice are straight 
for the hole. 



212 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"Don't read the rules; they interfere with your 
judgment. 

"Don't improve your lie while your opponent 
is looking. 

"Don't ask a two-handicap man to play with 
you, and expect him to be pleased with yotir 
game. 

"Don't coiint a 'swing over'; it is not fair to 
your score. 

" Don't play a bad lie ; it might injure your club. 

"Don't talk for more than five minutes on the 
putting-green after you have holed out; it 
delays your game. 

"Don't fail to blame the Green Committee for 
all your bad shots, 

"Don't neglect to hustle those ahead; any 
delay is an injustice to those following you. 

"Don't call your golf sticks such an ordinary 
name as clubs; 'bats' is a much snappier one." 

IF YOU WIN 

Don't brag about it. 
Let yowc opponent down easy. 
Let him praise the splendid game you imdoubt- 
edly put up. 

If he doesn't do it, don't lose your interest in life. 

When You Lose 

Don't come in saying it was "the rottenest 
game" you ever played. It may be, but don't 
say it. If you must, say it inwardly, or retire to 
the seclusion of the near-by woods. Remember 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 213 

that if you say it was the "rottenest game you 
ever played," yoiu" statement is a reflection on 
your opponent's achievements if he won, and a 
double reflection if he lost. 

HANDICAPS 

In making up your game, be fair in the matter 
of handicaps. You will get along better and do 
better work. 

It will help your gam.e if you take a percentage 
the worst of it. At the same time, your splendid 
reputation as a generous good fellow will not 
suffer. 

Many games are won at the first tee, because 
there are those who do not wish to enter into a 
long argument regarding the handicap difference. 

Others, without serious thought, but in well 
intended spirit, realize the value of a winning 
finish, by fine negotiations on the train, or at the 
first tee. Ultimately this will be discounted 
because the game one puts up will be known. 

It is far better, therefore, to be generous, and 
not allow the desire, or habit, to grow of wanting 
to win every game. 

MATCHING CARDS 

Matching cards, although not playing together, 
is not to be commended, although it gives con- 
siderable pleasvue to many players. 

In matching cards the man whose conscience 
cuts perhaps too fine will insist on holeing out 



214 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

every putt, even though it be not more than six 
inches from the hole. 

Another man, equally upright and sincere, 
does not regard short putts a foot or eighteen 
inches as important, and may not hole his, or 
one of his opponents may knock the ball away, 
and say : ' ' We will give it to you. ' ' 

One can readily see, therefore, how imequal the 
contest is. 

The extra conscientious man is all very well 
in his way, but he soon becomes a bore to the 
other one, two, or three men he is playing with, 
for they have no such card matches and they 
desire to get on. 

Many times on a crowded golf course a four- 
some may be playing behind one just ahead. The 
players are detained imnecessarily. By observa- 
tion they find one of the preceding four is putting 
out every ball. The others are conceding strokes, 
lifting their balls, and starting off the green. 

The plan of matching cards therefore affects 
all the players following on a busy course. 

There are differences or agreements in the 
game, which, when opponents are together, can 
be determined, as to how they shall be construed. 

When not playing together, each construes for 
himself. 

It does not make for good golf. While there 
are special occasions when it is an unusual 
pleasure to match cards with some friend, whom 
you cannot play with, the habit should not be 
encouraged. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 215 

Then, one ought to remember, there are many 
men with good clubable spirit who will not turn 
down a proffer of this kind at the first tee, but 
who wotild much prefer not to do it. 

HOW VIEWPOINTS DIFFER 

One beautiful afternoon at Palm Beach, about 
six o'clock in the evening, two sets of players 
were crossing each other near the sixteenth or 
seventeenth greens of the golf course. 

One said very enthusiastically, "Hello, Jim." 

"Hello, Harry," the other responded quietly. 

"Say, Jim, I suppose you have noticed what a 
beautifiil evening this is. Was there ever any- 
thing like it? Look at the western sky, and see 
the sun setting in that riot of color! Then note 
how it reflects its glory over the dark blue ocean 
on the eastern sky! Now look above, and note 
the very imusual gray-blue extending over the 
entire dome ! Again I ask you to view the beau- 
tiful oleander and hibiscus bushes, the flowers 
and palm trees in the distance, and also to re- 
gard the soft velvety tread given by Nature's 
own green tapestry you are walking on, and I 
ask you again, 3'ou, who have traveled so much, 
do you remember ever such another departing 
day, in any part of the world, like this? " 

Jim waited a moment; then he looked at the 
speaker and said, "How does your game stand?" 

' ' I am three up and two to go. " 

With rather a sad expression, the response was : 

"Well, I thought you could see a blame sight 

15 



2i6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

more than I. I have had a tough game; I am 
two down and one to go." 

MAGNIFICENT DIRECTION 

The late King Edward of England was starting 
out to play a game. An old Scotch caddie or 
professional standing near was known to have 
some pleasant complimentary remark regarding 
every shot he saw. A bystander was sure he 
would have to say something about the Prince's 
first shot, regardless of how good the shot was. 
The Prince topped the ball slightly and it rolled 
four or five feet from the tee, straight toward 
the hole. 

"My! my!" said the old Scotchman, "that 
was magnificent direction." 



Confer, hut avoid rankling disputes. Remember 
that you may have your best friend among those 
who disagree with you. Men can disagree 
with their heads and agree in their hearts. 



CHAPTER XVIII 
HANDICAPS 

We are indebted to Mr. H. C. Fownes for 
the following information regarding the methods 
in vogue at Oakmont for determining handicaps 
for foursomes and four-ball matches. Mr. Fownes 
writes : 

"Our scale is designed entirely for foursomes. 
We found both in mixed foursomes and in men's 
foursomes that a scratch player when coupled 
with ^ handicap partner and given one half of the 
combined handicap of the two, almost invariably 
came in a winner. This you can readily under- 
stand. The scratch player got the benefit of 
his partner's handicap and did about three 
quarters of the playing. The scale for foursomes 
is based on a penalty graded in accordance with 
the difference in the handicap of the two partners. 
Where this difference is six to ten, five per cent is 
deducted from the total handicap and then the 
remainder is divided by two to establish the 
handicap for the pair; eleven to fifteen, the dis- 
count is ten per cent; sixteen to twenty, fifteen 
per cent; twenty-one to twenty-five, twenty per 
cent; twenty-six to thirty, twenty-five per cent; 
thirty-one to thirty-five, thirty-five per cent. 
These high figures, of course, apply only to the 
mixed foursomes and it does the work very 
accurately; for example, a scratch player coupled 

217 



2i8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

with a twenty-handicap partner woiild work out 
in this way: 

"The difference in handicap is 20 and the sum of 
the handicaps is 20 ; fifteen per cent from 20 leaves 
the total handicap of 17, and divided by 2 makes 
this pair 8>^, which is equal to 9. 

"I do not know of any way to handicap four- 
ball matches better than to allot each player his 
proper handicap and apply on all the holes 
wherever they come and figure the net scores. 
We have found in our observation that the old 
rule of three-quarters handicap for match play 
is not sufficient. We have demonstrated this 
beyond all question at Oakmont. We now allow 
seven eighths of the medal score handicap for 
match play and are not certain that this is 
sufficient. My private opinion is that a man 
entitled to say ten strokes over a scratch player 
will not win more than half his matches in playing 
against a scratch man if he is allowed his fiill ten 
strokes applied on the holes according to the club 
card scale." 

"BIRDS AND EAGLES" 

An interesting event in playing a foursome- 
ball match is to play for a small added prize. One 
of these is called "Birds and Eagles." 

If a player makes a hole in one imder bogey, he 
will have a credit from each of the other players. 
If he makes the hole in two under bogey, he will 
have a double credit from each of the other 
players. 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 219 

AMUSING GOLF CONTESTS 

A goat contest is a very popular golf event. 
Usually playing members or an invited few buy 
goat medals. The club itself awards a large 
bronze or gold goat medal. The ordinary medals 
usually have a goat on one side and the player's 
name on the other. They are not of gold 
unless the winner is the champion of the goat 
herd. Any player can challenge another for 
his goat, and the player who owns the great- 
est number of goat medals at the end of the 
season is the winner of the contest. Getting 
a man's goat is a very great event. Some- 
times a real goat is presented to the season's 
winner. 

Cross-country golf is playing from the tee of 
one hole to the green of another, taking the holes 
of the course in the best possible way. That is, 
suppose you play from the tee of number one to 
the green of number eight, and so on. Usually a 
course is laid out judiciously, mixing the tees 
and greens of different holes, and the result is an 
amusing contest. 

In a flag contest each player is given a small 
American flag. His handicap is arranged to 
bring him as near as possible to the eighteenth 
cup. If Mr. A has a handicap of twelve it is 
figured that with ninety-six strokes he ought to 
be able to complete the round. Then wherever 
his ninety-sixth stroke finishes he plants his flag, 
and the player wins whose flag is nearest the 
eighteenth cup. 



220 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 




"Play out" 
SPORT FOR SPORT'S SAKE 

Brown (playing the last hole in the club 
tournament) : I ' ve a notion this confounded 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 221 

branch is rotten. But blamed if I 'm going to 
lose a stroke at this stage of the game. 

ALL NOT BROKEN 

A player was having a hard time one day, 
having broken two clubs, and at the moment 
found himself in a bad place in the fifteenth 
bunker. Turning to his caddie, who was an old 
man and knew very little about the game, he 
said: "I think I will quit the game entirely and 
go back to the clubhouse." 

The old caddie responded: "I wouldn't do 
that, sir, because you have five clubs here that 
have not been broken." 

WHAT IS YOUR HANDICAP? 

Two ladies are approaching the first tee. One 
was not a good player, nor was she acquainted 
with the terms of golf. The better player said : 
"By the way, what is your handicap?" 
The other, looking around cautiously, said : 
"Not so loud, please; here he comes!" 



Brag about the last three holes you played. 
You will then find that pride goeth before a 
fall, and the bumps are hard and rough. 



CHAPTER XIX 
THE CADDIE 

IN noting the impression players are likely 
to make on caddies, the following may be 
interesting : 

In the semi-finals in a tournament on the 
Chicago north shore a few years ago a friend of 
mine was playing with a well-known north-shore 
doctor. At the second tee my friend sliced his 
ball into the rough, the ball going nearly one 
himdred and seventy-five yards. When he 
reached the ball he found it beautifully teed for 
as nice a driver shot as he ever had. He looked 
at the ball with a suspicion that all was not as it 
should be, and remarked to the caddie, "You 
should not have placed the ball quite so high." 
The reply was, "That was the best place I could 
find." On further questioning, the caddie said 
the original lie was bad. My friend soon foimd 
that the caddie was comparatively new at the 
work. He drove the ball as it was, using the 
driver, and got a beautiful second. 

On coming up to the doctor he immediately 
explained the situation, telling him he was out of 
the tournament. In a cordial way, but without 
time for careful consideration, the doctor said to 
pay no attention to it. The friend insisted, and 
desired to retiun to the clubhouse. His opponent 
asked him not to do this, as he was anxious to 

222 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 223 

play a game any way, so they made the round 
and had a pleasant afternoon, but of course he 
did not feel the desire to win, nor did he wish 
to further embarrass his opponent by winning if 
he could. 

They did not report the boy to the club, agree- 
ing to say that the player had been disqualified 
and that he had at once reported the disqualifica- 
tion to his opponent, thereby giving him the game. 

The players did not desire to make it hard for 
the thoughtless caddie, but both gave him a 
lecture, which probably resulted in helping the 
boy all through his future service on the links. 

I sometimes think players should consider the 
impression yoting boys are likely to receive by 
the method of play, the conversation, and the 
attitude in trying ordeals of club members and 
friends. It is far more important to make an 
impression on the caddie for general all-round 
squareness and generosity in play, than to behave 
or talk unseemly, or to win a game through some 
trick, which might impress the boy one of two 
ways. The first might be to have him note how 
really small a big man — perhaps a man of good 
reputation — can be; or a second impression 
might be, "He won that game by a pretty good 
trick. I will try it myself when I get an 
opportimity." 

IMPROVEMENT OF CADDIES 

The members of a golf club in Chicago desire 
to find, as well as to show they appreciate, the 



224 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

good qualities of their caddies. They have 
under consideration for adoption a system of 
awards to consist of cash prizes to be distributed 
at or about Christmas time, according to the 
merit of each caddie. 

The system if adopted will comprise three 
classes. Classes one and two will be listed as good 
to fair caddies, according to attendance, courtesy, 
good behavior, personal appearance, and ability. 
They will receive marks for good, and marks for 
behavior not good, — smoking, drinking, discour- 
tesy, slovenly appearance, swearing, and poor 
caddie work. 

Caddies will be reduced or advanced according 
to marking. Class three will be termed "re- 
cruits." The prizes will go only to Classes one 
and two, so that any Class one or two caddie, 
falling into Class three, will forfeit his claim to 
a prize. 

This does not mean that a Class three boy is 
a poor caddie. It may mean he is new, without 
experience, or has temporarily drifted from the 
higher classification. 

All boys in Class three will receive merit marks 
when entitled to them. On a certain number of 
good marks they will be promoted to Class two. 

Boys in Class two will be promoted to Class 
one on their merits, in the same manner. 

A caddie who is in the first class, bringing in a 
given number of reports indicating fair or poor, 
shall, after adequate investigation to justify 
correctness, be lowered to the second or third 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 225 

class, according to the seriousness of the complaint. 

All caddies will receive a badge upon a deposit 
of twenty-five cents, which amoiint will be 
returned to them upon return of the badge. 
This charge is made merely to insure a proper 
care of the club's property, be the value a large 
or a small sum. 

Each badge shall be distinct, so the player 
will recognize the fact that he has a Class one, 
two, or three caddie. The chances are the 
members will help caddies of any class rather than 
feel injured by drawing a new caddie. 

The rate of pay will be different for each class — 
Class one naturally being the highest. 

WHY JOE TALBERT LOVES BOYS 

Joseph Talbert's consideration for caddies was 
often noted at the Chicago Golf Club. Perhaps 
we can find a reason for his kindness and under- 
standing of boys in a letter written to me by 
his cousin, Walter Talbert, telling of their child- 
hood days on the old cotton plantation in 
Mississippi, where, as barefoot boys, they spent 
so many happy days together. 

Many fine-grained men locate their later 
sympathy and solicitude for boys by memories of 
their own boyhood, memories only changed by 
condition and environment. 

"Joe and I would thtimp the big watermelons 
nearly ripe, in the patch by the side of a fine veg- 
etable garden. Near by t'here were chickens and 
the ducks, peafowls and the guineas, not to speak 



226 PRO AND CON OP GOLF 

of the mocking birds, bluebirds, orioles, and we 
were always on the lookout for meddlesome 
hawks. 

"Our stubbed toes and sunburned backs re- 
ceived a real treat when we jumped into the cool 
swimming hole in the creek. Undressed, we used 
to climb to the big trees by the side of the cold 
flowing spring. The tree was entwined in the 
clutches of a grapevine that almost covered it, 
giving forth in season the most deHcious wild 
grapes ever grown. 

"An old gourd dipper hung on the inside of the 
springhouse, but we did not use it, because we 
would rather lie down flat and drink. That was 
our way. 

"We used to gather the fruits of a splendid old 
orchard; and often when there was no work or 
mischief to do we would climb up in the stable 
loft and take a nap in loose com fodder, sometimes 
to the 'pitter-patter' of the rain. 

"Worn out by romping and play, on bright 
simshiny days of summer we strolled over to the 
pasture, and in the shade of an old oak tree lay 
flat on our backs and looked at the clear blue 
skies, wondering what it could all mean, and 
chatter of what amazing things we'd do when 
we 'grew up.' 

" How we longed for the evenings to come when 
we were to ride old 'Jeff' and 'Becky' down to 
the pasture, to drive up the cows at milking time. 

"At 'cotton-picking time' we loved to gather 
the fleecy locks; then to the cotton ginnery where 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 227 

we would stand for hours and watch the singing 
darkies drive two double teams of mules around 
and around. The mules were hitched to great 
hickory beams, making the power to gin the 
cotton for baling. And the rare fun we had, 
playing in the piles of cotton seed, as the seashore 
children have in building sand houses. 

"I tell you, these memories are very dear to 
me, and I know they are to Joe."^ 

DOES IT PAY? 

Text of a report submitted to a recent meeting 
of the officers of a Chicago Golf Club, by the 
Chairman of the House Committee, who hap- 
pened to be the writer: 

"I desire to report on the caddie dinner given 
at the club house on Thanksgiving Eve. 

"In this connection permit me, however, to 
make the record of these dinners more complete 
by stating that the first dinner of this kind was 
given at the clubhouse by the writer on Thanks- 
giving Eve, a year ago. 

"There were one hundred and fifty boys present 
at the first dinner. Mr. Charles L. Allen and 
the writer represented the officers of the club. 
Among others than the caddies who were invited 

1 Joseph T. Talbert is an ex-president of the Chicago Golf Club. 
A few years ago he was first vice-president of the Continental and 
Commercial National Bank of Chicago, and is now vice-president of 
the National City Bank, New York. At the time the letter was 
written, Mr. Talbert was very ill. Before his illness he was fond of 
entertaining many of his western golfing friends at clubs around New 
York, especially Garden City, Sleepy Hollow, and Wkyagyl. We are 
glad to say to his thousands of friends that at the time this book goes 
to press Mr. Talbert is steadily improving. 



2 28 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

and were present were Charles Evans, Jr., 
David Foulis and his father, Spencer Meister, 
Willie his then assistant, and William Griffin, 
editor of the Young American Golfer magazine. 
I think all agreed that the affair was a success. 
Encouraging results were noted during the past 
summer. 

"This year the club entertained one himdred 
and sixty-eight caddies. All but eight had cad- 
died not less than five times on our links during 
the summer. That was the rule in order to 
limit the invitations and make it differ from an 
open affair. The eight above referred to were 
caddies who had not caddied at all on our 
links, or if so, had caddied less than five times. 
However, some of the boys brought them 
along through a misunderstanding, and we let 
them in. 

"The dinner this time was given by the club 
and was well served by the manager and assist- 
ants. There was amusement in the nature of a 
ventriloquist and also a magician. The music 
was furnished in the main by our own victrola. 
We also arranged some songs. All joined in 
singing. Two of the yoimg fellows were able to 
lead. One little caddie, WilHe Frazer, about ten 
or eleven years of age, gave us a clog dance on 
the center dining table after the table coverings 
had been removed. It was so successful that 
arnid tremendous applause he had to give an 
encore. 

"At this dinner the officers of the club were 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 229 

represented by the president of the club, Mr. 
Gilbert E. Porter, and myself. We made short 
addresses, as did also Spencer Meister and 
David Foulis. The trend of the remarks sum- 
marized was along this line: 

" ' The members of the club had just one reason 
for giving this dinner for you boys. We wish you 
to know that attention to your work, poUteness, 
and good manners will always bring reward. 
Whether you continue in the employment of 
others or have others in your employ as you grow 
into manhood you will find this principle holds 
true. It is the boy who is attentive to his work 
and courteous to his superiors who is promoted 
to the important positions.' 

"Aside from the caddies, the same guests were 
invited this year and all were present with the 
exception of Charles Evans, Jr., who was out of 
town. On a motion of one of the lads, a rousing 
vote of thanks was extended to the club and all 
connected with the affair. 

"Complimentary telegrams from Judge E. H. 
Gary of the United States Steel Corporation, 
Charles Evans, Jr., and Jeff Adams were read. 
Judge Gary was a Wheaton boy. Jeff Adams 
was formerly one of our caddies, and is now an 
assistant professional at the links in French Lick, ' 
Indiana. 

"I desire to make this report for the records, as 
I can think of nothing that our club could do at 
so small a cost that would be more valuable. 
Of course I do not think that it makes new boys 



230 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

out of old, or that it is going to radically change 
every boy. Like other parts of life, advancement 
has its percentage features. There is such a 
large number of these bo3^s who understand and 
appreciate this attention that it must reflect itself 
in future attitude and action. 

"I also think that the little publicity given to 
the matter makes an influence for good throughout 
the entire community of Wheaton, Glen Ellyn, 
and the other surrounding towns, from which the 
boys come. 

"I am informed that the parents of the boys 
appreciate the attention that the club members 
thus give to their children. The reflective 
benefit from this is important. I cannot too 
highly commend the plan as a permanent feature 
of our club life. 

"To make the record more complete, permit 
me also to add that during the year we had some 
gymnasium apparatus installed on an unused 
portion of the club's property, to the east of the 
clubhouse. These are made of heavy iron pipe, 
in the shape of swings, ladders, and horizontal 
bars. 

"We had the old caddie house removed to this 
place, a covered platform attached, also lock- 
ers, so that the boys could keep their lunches 
there. The ground was cleared so that indoor- 
outdoor baseball could be played. The boys 
have arranged a few holes for putting. The 
improvement cost was small compared with 
results obtained. There will be little, if any, 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 231 

expense connected therewith in the future."^ 
ARE ALL GOLFERS AS MODEST? 

A shy young member of one of the principal 
golf clubs had been calling on "the sweetest girl 
in the world" for many moons. He had many 
opportimities, as her father's home was near the 
links, but being very bashful, his suit progressed 
slowly. Finally she decided it was up to her 
to start something, so the next time he called, 
she said: 

"I'll give you a kiss for that rose." 

He blushed, and the exchange was made. 
Then, taking his hat, he started to leave. 

"Where are you going?" she asked. 

"To the florist for more roses," he replied. 

THE UNCOMPLIMENTARY CADDIE 

Walter J. Travis, the expert amateur golf 
player, told this story to ex-President Taft as 
the best anecdote about golf he had ever heard: 

Old Mr. Brown had played the game for years 
with great assiduity and without any noticeable 
improvement in his performance. Employing 
the same caddie every afternoon, he fought the 
greens and hazards unrelentingly. The caddie, 
however, being discreet and always desirous of tips, 
never voiced his real opinion of Mr. Brown's game. 

One day a stranger came to the links and 
arranged to play a roimd with Mr. Brown. Mr. 

1 This caddie report is given here for the chance encouragement 
there may be for other clubs to do likewise. 

16 



232 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



Brown came over to his caddie and asked con- 
fidentially : 

"Bobbie, have you ever seen this gentleman 
play?" 

"Yes, sir," replied Bobbie. 

"How is his game?" 

"Rotten, sir; very rotten." 

"How much handicap can I give him?" asked 
Mr. Brown, as if seeking reliable information. 

"Sir," replied the caddie, "not a stroke; not a 
stroke." 




^^^^ 



^^^^ I>AT FELLER C!VRI\1EG:1E 
^^^^ COULD Do WORSE 'N 

6L1P ms BU& A IMEDftL!J 



-^feW M<CvTcweoN^ 



A real hero of "Bunker" Hill 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 233 

IN MODEST FLORIDA 

During a dinner at Palm Beach one of the 
speakers illustrated with a story the modesty of 
Florida caddies: 

" One warm February morning here in Florida," 
he said, "I was motoring with a lady, and by 
a stream we got out to gather flowers. After a 
while a boy whom I recognized as one of the 
caddies, said: 

"'Say, mister, is that your girl over there?' 

"'Yes, I suppose so,' said I. 

" 'Well, tell her to go away from here,' said he. 
'Us fellers wants to go in swimmin'.' 

"I told the lady of this odd request, but she 
had not yet finished her bouquet. She said, with 
a laugh, I must tell the boys she would n't look. 
She 'd shut her eyes or look the other way. 

"This they were duly told. They consulted 
gravely on it. Then the spokesman returned 
and I said: 'Well, is it all right — are they going 
in?' 

"'Naw, the fellers say dey dassent trust her.'" 

UNWORTHY OF RECOGNITION 

Some years ago, on the Tuscumbia links at 
Green Lake, Wisconsin, it was customary in the 
middle of the season for young boys, sons of 
the members, to help out in caddying when 
the regular caddies were engaged. Many of the 
boys were glad to do this as it gave them a 
little extra spending money. I remember my 



234 PRO AND CON OP GOLF 

own boy gladly occupied himself in this way 
whenever required, and we occasionally en- 
couraged it. 

In this way it happened that Warren Wood, 
who has since risen to the eminence of being a golf 
champion, was caddying for a gentleman. 

Directly ahead of this twosome was another, 
which included Warren's father, John Wood of 
Chicago. At one point there was quite a wait 
so that the two twosomes were close together. 
The John Wood twosome was the first to get 
started. The others watched their play. Mr. 
Wood, who was even then a very good player, 
made an exceedingly poor shot, hitting the 
ground with a dull thud some three or four inches 
behind the ball. 

The gentleman for whom Warren was caddying 
remarked to the boy: "Who is that dub?" 

The boy's answer, out of a heart full of chagrin, 
was: "I don't know." 

TOO LONG A WAIT 

Novice (with great determination after nu- 
merous attempts): I'll stay here till I hit this 
ball. 

Caddie : Weel, ye can get some ither laddie to 
haud yor sticks, for this is ma bath nicht." 

THE "TEE PARTY" 

The Caddie: Beg pardon, lady, but yer 
mustn't sit 'ere — the gentlemen says as it's 
dangerous. 



PRO AND CON OP GOLF 235 

The Lady: You tell the gentlemen to mind 
their own business; and, anyway, I'm sitting on 
my mackintosh, and I'm not rheumatic." 



Blasphemy in the presence of caddies never 
produced a better shot; at the same time it 
took a big slice of gentleman out of a player. 



CHAPTER XX 
SOME PHILOSOPHY 

SOME, years ago on the links at Palm Beach 
several players had a lesson — that one at 
least has not forgotten. 

It was about nine-thirty in the morning of a 
day that bade fair to be very warm. The rack 
at the first tee was loaded down with balls. 
Twenty to twenty-five men were waiting to start, 
when some one called attention to a notable four- 
some just coming in on the eighteenth green. 

The players, as I remember, were Marshall 
Field, Norman B. Ream, H. C. Frick, and 
Robert T. Fair. One of the observers, more keen 
than the rest, said that a lesson could be drawn 
from that foursome finishing their game at such 
an early hour. 

" May it not be," said he, "this is the way that 
group got to the front and held their own with 
modest accumulations through the years? They 
have had their good game in the cool hours of 
the morning; the course was all theirs; they now 
have the day for rest or light exercise of a different 
kind; they .avoided the jam on these crowded 
links. Here we are, twenty to twenty-five men, 
waiting for a turn. When we finish, it will be 
under the boiling sun in the hottest hour of the 
day." The philosopher, continuing, said: 

"We stayed up too late; we ate too much. 

236 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 237 

These men did not do this; they had a good 
night's rest and awakened refreshed. May it 
not also be true that, when in the past they 
bought bonds, stocks, or merchandise, they 
bought when few others were buying? When 
they served their customers, or any one they 
were depending upon for a clientele, it was with 
the same class of service they gave themselves 
this morning. When they bought their Christ- 
mas presents they probably bought them in 
November, getting them cheaper and saving 
their December vitality for other and more 
valuable work. And so on through life. It is 
not hard to see the lesson of the game, and realize 
at once why they stand so high in business 
acumen and success, so far and away above the 
hoards in the average of rank." 

We all looked at the philosopher in awe and 
respect which was only broken by one of the 
nimiber. He pointed toward a small, gray- 
haired and gray-bearded man, standing near, 
quietly smoking a villainous looking black pipe, 
a man who had more than sixty years to his 
credit. Then he said, in a voice mingled with 
disdain on one side and admiration on the other: 
"There is a man who can give any one of them — 
rntilti-millionaires — a stroke a hole, play for a 
lead pencil or a thousand bucks, and win with 
ease." The man referred to was Walter Fair- 
banks of Denver. No man vouchsafed a reply. 

There you have the lesson, — and a comment, if 
not an answer. Think it over. 



238 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

JUST A TOUCH OF LIFE 

On finishing a bad game, many players make 
high resolves, but build no ladders up to them. 
Later they wonder why their game does not 
improve. 

The professional looks on and wears a sad but 
knowing smile. A few dollars thrown his way for 
advice, study and application, and what a change 
there could be! But no, all but about five per 
cent prefer to dub it year after year. Is n't it 
just like life? 



Golfers who have not a just estimate 
of their own limitations are always get- 
ting into trouble. Trouble means worry. 
Worry means a poorer game. 



CHAPTER XXI 
SOCIAL POSITION OP GOLP 

GOLP, of course, is one of the leading centers 
of society, especially country life in the 
summer season. The part played by society in 
golf, therefore, can be very large, and generally is 
so. Hugh Dobree has written about the inter- 
relation of the two spheres as follows: 

"Society is supposed to have found a serious 
rival to golf in skating, and habitues of the park 
end of Piccadilly will tell you that the game of 
golf is hardly likely to attract the better-class 
individuals in the same way that it has done in 
the past. Of course this is all bosh, and the 
question of social position on the links really does 
not matter one little bit. One has only to look 
at the golfers at North Berwick to see with what 
keenness the best people, socially, delight in 
playing a round with one of the many fisherfolk 
who live in the district. It is absurd to put on 
side when the golf links is the hunting ground. 
Your tailor in all probability belongs to the same 
club as yourself, but you cannot get away from 
the fact that he has exactly the same privileges 
as you and can do what you can. Possibly he 
can do golf better than you, and there are less 
imlikely things than his being a sportsman. 

"If all the old traditions with regard to the 
game are upheld the social feeling is not a great 

239 



240 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



one. You cannot imagine the holy land of golf 
in the olden days and picture any swank among 




Aristocracy and democracy 



the players. It is not the same thing as walking 
arm in arm down St. James's Street with your 
golfing opponent. It merely means that when 
you are within the sporting limits of a golfing 
area all men must be socially equal. There are 
any number of people who will disagree on this 
point, but one only has to look at the courses 
near London to see how very true the statement 
is. After all, why should we clamor out on the 
hilltops that we are superior to the fellow who 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 241 

owns the adjoining locker to ours in the club- 
house? If he did such a thing we should very 
soon hail him as a snob and most certainly lacking 
in etiquette. 

" In France the status is different. I have often 
wondered how they manage to keep so many 
of their clubs open only to a certain clique of 
players. I do not refer to the popular resorts 
which attract the best as well as the bourgeois, 
but I really had in my mind a collection of well- 
known clubs to which none but gentlemen by 
birth are admitted as members. Possibly their 
idea as to what a gentleman by birth really means 
is different from omts, but at any rate they have a 
most stringent rule on the point which seems to 
work out satisfactorily with all the members. 

"At some places in England we carry our 
social position to a higher altitude than is neces- 
sary, and my memory reminds me of the story 
of a certain rich shopkeeper who had a private 
golf course not a great distance from London. 
He was an entirely self-made man, and I daresay 
he coiild put his hand on as much money as any 
landowner living at the time. He was a sports- 
man to the finger tips, and I recollect qmte well 
how he used to open the little clubhouse to every- 
body who happened to be in the district. 

"The interior was clothed with everything the 
goiirmet could wish for, and you will naturally 
realize that honorary membership to this club 
was sadly abused. The proprietor was seldom 
there, but the clubhouse remained open to all and 



242 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

sundry. One day some local ' bloods ' cleared out 
every bottle of wine in the place, and after this 
the owner closed the club for good and all. Some 
years later he sold the course to a syndicate, and 
the committee blackballed him from membership 
on account of his trade. 

"Golf was just beginning to go ahead then, 
and it is an actual fact that some few years later 
the officers of this very club, finding that their 
finances were very rocky, asked the discarded 
gentleman if he would accept the presidency of 
the club. Not unnaturally he refused, and started 
in all possible speed another club, which now runs 
smoothly, and finally ended the existence of the 
original club. 

"The social spirit of to-day has changed 
very considerably. A man who behaves himself 
as a gentleman on the links will always command 
the deepest respect and be looked up to by one 
and all. The moment he shows from every tee 
and bimker that he believes himself socially 
superior to the others his end of respectability is 
near at hand. 

"The government of ovu game is lacking in 
power. It is not unlike the Conservative party. 
One day they will be ready and perhaps we shall 
then see an altered state of things, but during 
the lifetime of our present system it is surely 
better to live and let live. Men are not neces- 
sarily bounders because they make ten thousand 
pounds a year from a wholesale business. That 
is the point which some people cannot see." 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 243 

WHERE CLASS PREVAILS 

Class does not play the same part in golf in 
the balance of the world as it does in England, as 
the following paragraphs by Charles (Chick) 
Evans indicate: 

"There is a vast difference in the position of 
the professional golfer in this country and in 
Great Britain. Whether it is better in one 
country or the other depends on one's point of 
view; the whole British attitude toward amateur 
and professional golf seems strange to an Amer- 
ican. Here amatetir golf attracts the greatest 
attention and the open tournaments, which are 
few, are attended by comparatively small galleries. 
In Great Britain, however, there is a regular 
schedule of exhibition matches and many tourna- 
ments for the professionals. It has often been said 
that the winning of the British Open means 
twelve or fifteen thousand dollars to the winner. 
Large galleries follow all the matches, and extra- 
ordinary interest is shown. 

"Everywhere appear public enthusiasm and 
admiration for the leading professional players 
that is imknown in this country; pictures of Braid, 
Vardon, and Ray, with long chronicles of their 
golfing feats, fill the British golf magazines. Yet 
in spite of the extraordinary attention showered 
upon them the British professionals never overstep 
the boimds fixed by caste. I shall never forget 
the first time I met James Braid; it was at Sand- 
wich in 191 1, and he was then open champion. 
Some one casually asked me if I would like to 



244 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

meet him, and of course I was delighted and 
particularly so because John Ball and I were to 
play him and Massy in the Coronation foursomes 
the next day. There stood the big rawboned 
man whose name and fame had traveled all over 
the world. 

"He doffed his cap and I, of course, mine, and 
he said 'sir' so often that I, being just a boy, 
grew a little confused. Then I asked some one 
why the professionals all stayed outside of the 
pretty little railing surrounding the Royal St. 
George's Club at Sandwich, and was told that no 
professional was ever allowed in a clubhouse. 
I also learned that no professional was ever 
addressed as Mr. These are small things, but 
utterly at variance with anything I had known 
in America. Over here I had sat alongside pro- 
fessionals at many banquets in club dining rooms, 
and although the professional's duties keep him 
mostly outside the clubhouse I had never heard 
of any rules upon the subject. It is true that 
many American club members are such ardent 
golfers that they spend their golfing time on the 
links and avoid the clubhouse. As a matter of 
fact, the whole subject of caste is of comparative 
unimportance to the true sportsman, and is chiefly 
interesting as an indicative of national custom. 
What Mr. Hutchinson terms * the cult of the pro- 
fessional' is almost unknown in America, but the 
caste Hnes of the older countries are also pretty 
generally ignored. 

"From the money point of view the big British 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 245 

professional has a great advantage over the 
American, but I am sure there are more clubs in 
America that furnish a comfortable living for the 
average 'pro.' 

*'For a long time the Scotch professional had 
everything his owti way, but now the American- 
bom * pro ' is coming to the front. 

"The evolution of the American professional 
is usually something like this : He begins as a boy 
caddie, and every boy caddie expects to become a 
professional as surely as his mother expects him to 
become President. All caddies play more or less, 
but the one that we have in view has shown up 
better than the others. His success at golf induces 
him to drop out of school. A little later he 
becomes a shop assistant for the professional, 
and when in the course of time he learns his trade 
he is able to secure a club for himself. 

- "Whether the life of a professional golfer, with 
all its fascination for the young, is entirely 
desirable, is an interesting question. There is 
a Hmited field, and many professionals are 
constantly 'out of a job.' 

"The life is wandering and not conducive to 
settled employment or steady habits, but there is 
a good living for the sober, industrious man who 
sticks to a good club, and there is big money for 
the leading professionals at the' biggest clubs. 
Above all and beyond all, there is health for the 
man who deserves it. Perhaps in this as in many 
other things it is merely a question of the man 
himself." 



246 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

WHY IS A SNOB? 

While there are perhaps fewer snobs on golf 
links than in any part of social life, still there are 
some. The question therefore arises, "Why is 
a snob?" 

Has snobbery a natiiral birth and growth, or 
does it develop by reason of environment, or 
through misconception of life's true values? 
When snobbery appears in the young, does it 
descend from the parents? Some believe that 
snobs make each other, and that the order follows 
as regularly as decades and generations. In 
other words, some think a snob is in the making 
when a climber is snubbed by a snob who is 
already in, or on the fringe of, so-called high 
society. 

Suppose a certain individual is a climber. It 
is not at all a discreditable position. However, 
the active climber receives many a jolt. Some 
cHmbers make the goal they seek, with at least 
a measure of success. Now, for every snub 
received while climbing, it is said, some deem it 
necessary to let some one else, perhaps a new 
climber, have one, — and there you are. What? 

Snubs seldom, if ever, come from those who 
are "to the manner bom," whether the degree 
of social impingement or prestige is high or low, 
or from those who ultimately reach a top-notch 
place. Kings, princes, presidents, or their wives, 
never snub any on^, — certainly not intentionally. 
Those who are secure in their position ring true. 
This means no more than that their conduct is 



PRO AxND CON OF GOLF 247 

gentle. They are real ladies and real gentlemen. 
In most cases the action is natural, — they cannot 
help it. In a gathering of any kind, their survey 
of a whole group is never so casual as to intention- 
ally overlook the more humble friend or acquaint- 
ance near by. 

The writer recalls an instance of an American, 
a personal friend, who had had a pleasant five- 
minute chat with the late King of England when 
he was Prince of Wales. After the prince had 
tiimed to speak to another acquaintance, the 
American passed to an adjoining room and met, 
almost face to face, a social light of his own city, 
one who, in said city, had arrived at a little 
better than "the halfway house" of social hopes. 
With a quick nod this person recognized my 
friend, then disappeared in the crowd. Whether 
the thought was that there would be a loss of 
the slight social advance made in the home city, 
or time would be wasted, if a moment's pause 
were made to exchange a pleasant word with 
a fellow American three thousand miles away 
from home, the latter did not know. 

In speaking of it a little later my friend said: 
"Why worry? That person is a snob. Yet," 
he continued, "if the individual had seen me 
conversing with the prince, or knew that I had 
met his Royal Highness the day before, in much 
the same way, a circle of barbed wire would not 
have kept him away from me, although I am a less 
pretentious fellow townsman. Strange, is it not ? ' ' 

Later, I am informed, this particular snob not 

17 



248 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

only came to grief, losing the hardly won social 
position in the home city, but sought a favor 
from the other. But that is another story. 

The moral is, climb if one will, — good society 
is a worthy goal, although there is a great dif- 
ference between the real thing and that constantly 
heralded as the real thing in New York and every 
large city. The old-time society leaders, like 
Mrs. Paran Stevens, led society by their excep- 
tional social gifts for giving proper entertainment 
and genteel pleasure, for intellectual adornment, 
and charitable conquests in securing money to be 
used for the less fortunate. 

However, in the climbing — the scramble, if you 
will — don't overlook, slight, or lose one old friend 
or acquaintance. It is n't worth it. Those who 
have reached or have been always on top, admit 
it is not worth it. This looks sensible. , More 
than good sense is not expected of any one. 
The snob — man, woman, boy, or girl — is a pest 
on the links or in the city. I mention the boy 
and girl, because, whether by force of example or 
not, snobbery begins early in life. It wounds 
the young most, because they do not appreciate 
how utterly stupid, foolish, and futile it is. 
Moreover, the snob is discovered quickly wher- 
ever the links are located, near great city- or 
small town. The entire club knows, just as the 
world within one's home environment knows, the 
"city snob." Let us discourage the process and 
at least it will be lessened if it does not entirely 
disappear. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 249 

ANOTHER POINT OF VIEW 

I have in mind a young man who is a golf 
player, the antithesis of all that pertains to 
conceit, ego, or vanity, one whose youth and 
success in the game could make any of these 
quite possible and, if not overdone, partially 
excusable. I will not mention his name. The 
reader will no doubt place him. 

Many of his acquaintances think he has lost 
important games through being too considerate 
of friends who were following the game. In 
other words, the winning of a match apparently 
did not seem so essential as the need for recog- 
nizing and having a pleasant word with friends of 
high or low degree. Were these friends bankers 
or caddies, it was just the same. Naturally this 
properly called out a difference of opinion on his 
action, in pivotal situations. Nevertheless he 
apparently could not help it. How important 
the occasion, mattered not. The disposition and 
the gentleman asserted themselves and seemed 
unconsciously, or otherwise, to be above the game 
and its winning, however much he desired to win. 

This is not a reflection on others who did not, 
or do not follow his attitude, — 

For after all is said and done, 

A game is a game, — 
Fairly played, is fairly won. 

But let us ask a question. Is it because of his 
genial, pleasant manner, as well as other good 
qualities, that he nimibers his friends and well 
wishers by the thousands? He may lose an 



2 so PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

important contest, but he holds and multiplies 
his friends, and these friends will be his long 
after the winning or losing of a contest shall have 
been quite forgotten. 



There never was a snob, on the links 
or anywhere else, man or woman, boy 
or girl, who didn't come to grief. 



CHAPTER XXII 
HISTORICAL 

GOLF has been a leading game in many 
nations for several centuries. Few attempts 
have been made to write its history. Perhaps 
the most concise of these historical efforts is 
contained in a little pamphlet that fell into my 
hands several months ago, and I cheerfully give 
a portion of it a place here not only because 
of its fund of information but because of the 
attractive way it is put together. Were my task 
one other than to deal primarily with the game 
itself, this chapter would deserve a forward place 
in this volimie: 

"St. Andrews, Musselburgh, and Prestwick, 
Scotland, are the headquarters of the game of 
golf. 

"Despite all attempts to learn its origin, golf 
still is a game of mysterious history. The 
ancient Dutch game of 'kolf,' the game of 'chole,' 
played in Belgium and the north of France, and 
'pell-mell,' favorite game of Mary Stuart, have 
aU been mentioned as progenitors of golf, but none 
of them seems to meet the test. Certain old 
Dutch tiles do show figures of golfers, and we 
know that golf balls were imported into Scotland 
from Holland. 

"'Gowff,' 'goff,' and 'golf are variants in the 
spelling of the name of this ancient game. 

251 



2 52 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"The spread of golf in the last two decades 
has been nothing short of marvelous. Every 
comer of the British Empire is provided with 
links. There are more in India than in England, 
it is said. No town of any pretensions in America 
is without its golf club and links. Yet the game 
has been played on this side of the Atlantic for 
only about a quarter of a century." 

Game op Kings 

"Golf surely deserves the title 'Royal and 
Ancient Game,' for it was played by most of the 
Scottish monarchs and by many of the kings of 
England, and its history is so long that the 
beginning is lost in the shadows of antiquity. 

"We do know that the game flourished in 
Scotland four hundred and fifty-four years ago. 

"James VI of Scotland, later James I of 
England, was the most ardent of the Stuart 
devotees of golf, and enacted that persons who 
attended church on Sunday morning might play 
golf and other games in the afternoon. 

"The oldest existing club is the Edinburgh 
Burgess Golfing Society, foimded in 1735; but 
the most famous is the Royal and Ancient Golf 
Club of St. Andrews, foimded in 1754, — the 
Mecca of aU golfers, and, by tacit consent, the 
maker of rules and etiquette for the game. 

"Blackheath links are the oldest in England, 
dating from 1608 ; but the game languished in that 
part of Britain imtil about 1864. 

"The British Amateur Championship was 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 253 

estabKshed by the Royal Liverpool Club, at 
Hoylake, in 1885, and the Ladies' Championship, 
at L5^ham St. Anne's, in 1893. 

"The earliest American clubs were St. Andrews, 
of Yonkers (N. Y.), 1888, and the Shinnecock 
Hills (L. I.), 1890. In the West, the Country 
Club, of Colorado Springs (Col.), 1891, and the 
Chicago Golf Club, 1893, are the oldest. 

"The first American Amateur Championship 
was held at Newport, in 1894, and the first 
championship held imder the auspices of the 
United States Golf Association, organized Decem- 
ber 24, 1894, was held at Newport in 1895." 

Golf and the Law 

"For military strength, proficiency in archery 
was once a necessity. In 1457 the Scotch Parlia- 
ment became alarmed at the way the people were 
neglecting archery for golf. The following quaint 
enactment was made: 'the Fute-baU and Golf 
be utterly cryit doime and nocht usit and that 
the bowe merkis be maid at ilk paroche kirk 
a pair of buttes and schuting be usit ilk Sunday.' 
Golf, however, survived this 'crying down' and 
only became more popular. 

"In Edinburgh, the town coimcil enacted 'that 
na inhabitants of the samyn be sene at any pas- 
times or games within or without the town on the 
Sabbath day, sic as Golf. ' On April 27, 1 6 5 1 , five 
men were arrested for Simday golf playing and 
were fined. One of them, Johne Howden, being 
a deacon, was deposed from his churchly office. 



2 54 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

"James VI came to the relief of the golfers and 
provided that any who had attended divine wor- 
ship in the morning might play golf and other 
games in the afternoon. The same monarch 
placed a prohibitive tariff on golf balls imported 
from Holland and gave the monopoly of manu- 
factiire for twenty-one years to one James Mel- 
vill, who was to stamp each ball. To guard 
against extortion, his price was limited to four 
shillings." 

Famous Golfers — Famous Matches 

"The House of Stuart in Scotland was a great 
supporter of the game of golf — James VI did 
much toward introducing it into England. 

"Henry, Prince of Wales, son of James VI of 
Scotland (I of England), was a famous golfer, as 
was his younger brother, Charles I, and also 
James I. 

"The unhappy Charles I was playing a match 
upon the links of Leith when he received a mes- 
sage telling of the Irish rebellion. He qmt the 
links in haste, and probably never rettuned to 
them. 

"Two English noblemen twitted the Duke of 
York (later James II) as to the relative merits 
of English and Scotch golfers, and agreed to play 
a match for large stakes, the duke to be permitted 
to pick any Scotchman for a partner. He chose 
one John Patersone, a shoemaker, and the play 
began. Royalty and commoner defeated the 
peerage badly, and from his winnings Patersone 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 255 

was able to build a house, which is still standing. 

"On the roll of famous golfers must appear the 
names of Dr. Johnson, David Garrick, and the 
Earl of Montrose. Mary Queen of Scots was 
seen playing golf and pell-mell within a few days 
of the death of her husband, Damley, and this 
scandalized many of her subjects. 

"King V/illiam IV of England was a royal 
patron of golf, presenting a gold medal and ' Green 
Ribband' to the St. Andrews Club in 1837, to be 
played for annually. Edward VII was captain 
of the same club. 

"The Bishop of Galloway in 16 10 was a great 
golf enthusiast. Tradition (probably invented by 
enemies of the game) says that he saw a vision 
while playing, which convicted him of sin, and 
went home and straightway died without, how- 
ever, confessing his fault." 

Knights of Golfiana 

"The longest holes in Great Britain are said 
to be the Long Hole at Blackheath, the fifth at 
St. Andrews, and the thirteenth at Westward Ho. 
The shortest is the second at Prestwick, about 
ninety yards. 

"Mr. Sceales, of Leith, drove a golf ball from 
the top of a barrel stave, fixed in the southeast 
comer of Parliament Square, over the spire of 
St. Giles Cathedral, one hundred and sixty-one 
feet high. 

"A Hke feat was performed by Mr. McLean, 
W. S., who lofted the ball over the Melville 



2s6 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Monument, Edinburgh, one hundred and fifty 
feet high. 

"It is recorded of one player, whose name is 
not preserved, that he played much by himself 
and could drive three balls from one hole to 
another (500 yards), each with the same number 
of strokes, and make them He on the green within 
club length. 

"Rev. Dr. Alexander Carlyle, of Inveresk, 
drove a ball through the archway at David Gar- 
rick's place, at Hampton, into the Thames in 
three strokes. Garrick obtained the club the feat 
was done with. 

"Allan Robertson is generally considered the 
greatest golfer who ever lived. He was bom at 
St. Andrews, September 11, 18 15, and died there 
September i, 1859. In all his career he never 
lost a match. He began playing in the days of 
leather balls stuffed with feathers, and once made 
them himself. 

"Tom Morris, Jr., made the record score on 
St. Andrews Hnks in 1869-77." 

Famous Clubs — Famous Courses 

"Among the oldest existing clubs are the Edin- 
burgh Btirgess Golfing Society, founded in 1735, 
the Honorable Company of Edinbiirgh Golfers, 
founded before 1744, and the Royal and Ancient 
Golf Club of St. Andrews, dating from 1754. 

"Blackheath links, the first in England, was 
founded in 1608, when James became King of 
England. 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 257 

"Perhaps the most picturesque links in Great, 
Britain is Prestwick. WilHe Campbell made the 
record of seventy-seven there. 

"The game played at Molesley Hurst in 1758 
is the earliest match on English soil of which we 
have definite record. The second recorded Eng- 
lish match was at Blackheath in 1766. 

"Many convivial times marked the early days 
at St. Andrews. Matches were held regularly 
every fortnight. Red coats were adopted as the 
club uniform in 1780, and members failing to 
wear the uniform while playing were fined in 
liquid measure. 

"George Glennie had the honor of setting a 
record for King William's medal, in 1855, at 
eighty-eight. It stood there until Horace G. 
Hutchinson made it eighty-seven in 1884. It 
speaks well for the advance of modem golf that 
no player has made such a high score in the play 
for this medal since S. Mure Ferguson made a 
new mark of seventy-nine in 1893. 

"In the minutes of the Honorable Company of 
Edinburgh Golfers is the following interesting 
record : 

" ' Leith, Nov. 16, 1776. This day, Lieutenant James 
Dalrymple, of the 43rd Regiment, being convicted of 
playing five different times without his uniform was 
fined only in Six Pints, having confessed the heinous- 
ness of his crime.' 

Ja. Cheap 

"'At his own request he was fined three Pints more.'" 



2S8 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

OVERCROWDING AT ST. ANDREWS 

When you find your club links sometimes too 
crowded for comfort, and you are moved to harsh 
criticism because of this congestion, stop to pon- 
der what troubles there have been at the very 
fotmtain seat of golf — Auld St. Andrews. During 
the holiday season of a recent year the overcrowd- 
ing annoyance at the old St. Andrews course 
caused a strained feeling between a section of the 
Royal and Ancient Club and the town council. 

It seems that the proposals of the town cotmcil 
links committee and a committee of the Royal 
and Ancient were not favored by many of the 
members of the club. In fact, the proposals were 
rejected, and the meeting submitted as its mini- 
mum requirements the following: 

"That during the summer two thirds of the places 
on the ballot for the old course between nine and eleven 
o'clock in the morning and one and three o'clock in the 
afternoon be reserved for ratepayers and members of 
the Royal and Ancient Club. 

"That Thursday and Saturday afternoons be re- 
served for artisan golfers; and 

" That a minimum tariff of is. (25 cents) be imposed 
on visitors." 

Should there be no opportimity to biing about 
a real entente on these demands, the Royal and 
Ancient will call a general meeting and recon- 
sider the whole matter. So if matters are not 
in accord with your ideas at your home club, 
would it not be wise to be cheerful, keeping in 
mind the troubles of the golfers at the old home 
of golf? 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 259 

CUP GAMES 

A list of the games or points of golf, for which 
cups may be played : 

Twosome, scratch hole play. 

Twosome, handicap hole play. 

Individual medal score. 

Foursome two-ball scratch hole play. 

Foursome two- and four-ball handicap hole play. 

Bogey competition, scratch. 

Bogey competition, handicap. 

Choice score — Best eighteen holes, playing eighteen 

holes morning and afternoon. 
Choice score of selected holes for season — usually a 

handicap for all members. 
Score of best game (eighteen holes) played during the 

season, usually handicap. 
Best hole made during a tournament. 
Worst hole made during a tournament. 
Worst score made during a tournament. 
One-club match. 
Flag contest. 
Plug-hat tournament. 
Father and son tournament. 
Benedict tournament. 
Tournament for players over fifty years of age — more 

or less. 
Handicap allowance of one stroke for all years over 

sixty years — more or less. 

MASSY, HERD, AND DUNCAN 

Massy, former French and British champion, 
introduces a remarkable amount of "stop" into 
his lofted shots and obtains the influence by 
means of a swing pectiliar to himself. At the 
top of his swing he gives the club a flourish which 
sends it over his head. Then he brings it back 
again and down in the same track as that which 
it occupied when going up. 



2 6o PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Herd and Duncan are masters of the spoon. 

When Herd calls for his spoon it is a foregone 

conclusion that he will reach the green. He gets 

a lot of cut in his spoon shot and makes the ball 

drop right up by the hole. He swings for it in 

just the- same way as for the cleek, but gives 

his body a slight turn at the hips before the club 

starts to come down and so obtains the effect of 

a slice. 

WHAT OF THE FUTURE? 

In the United States alone, during the past 
year, a hundred new courses have been laid out 
and fifty thousand men and women have joined 
in the game of golf. Undoubtedly this is the 
greatest growth that any game has ever enjoyed. 

The new golfers have badly congested the 
pleasant playing conditions of many clubs, and 
should there be another increase of fifty thousand 
or a hundred thousand members during this or 
another season there will be trouble ahead. 
Realizing this, a few towns and cities which are 
intelligently conducted are preparing to lay out 
public golf coiirses for their citizens, while many 
private links are in course of construction. 

Encouragement of the strongest kind should 
be given the establishment of public links. Far 
too many are the places where thought is sleeping 
on this proposition. Leading citizens and public 
officials are overlooking the future health and 
enjoyment of the people in their localities. 

A splendid feature of golf is that each new 
recruit becomes a player for life, the percentage 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 261 

of those losing interest in the game being neg- 
Hgible. Another pecuHar development in this 
wonderful game is that whereas formerly it was 
to be indulged in only by the rich, or well-to-do, 
to-day it is the game of the middle classes. The 
tremendous value of all this to any nation is 
incalculable. 

MY FIRST GOLF 

I recall the first time I had an invitation to join 
a golf club. About the year 1893 I happened to 
meet my friend, C. Norman Fay of Chicago, He 
asked me to permit him to propose my name for 
membership in the Chicago Golf Club. 

As I recall it, I do not believe the club was then 
playing on the present course in Wheaton, or 
it was just about to start. 

Of course I treated the request courteously, 
but Mr. Fay sank in my estimation. Here was 
a fine, full-grown man of splendid business repu- 
tation and standing, inviting another business 
man to join a club that seemed to have for its 
main motive the knocking and chasing of a little 
white rubber ball over acres of country land that 
ought to be used for farming! 

I declined as politely as I could. I am glad, 
now, he never knew all the thoughts that filled 
my mind that day. 

I recall also that for some years after, I avoided 
the golf course at the resort where I spent my 
summer vacations. And it was only late one 
summer, after nearly all others had departed. 



262 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

that I was enticed to the golf links, because the 
wind on Green Lake had suddenly gone down, 
leaving the sails on my yacht Ramona silently 
flapping in a gentle breeze, — too Hght to move 
the boat from the golf-club pier. 

Standing at the first tee, I witnessed Joe 
De Moss (afterwards champion of Wisconsin) 
drive a ball over a high clump of trees, landing 
about three feet from the first hole. 

"That looks easy. I'll try it," I said. 

My experience was quite different from that 
of many others in making the first attempt. My 
ball did not go into the woods, nor roll a few 
feet ahead of the tee. It followed Joe De Moss' 
ball almost on a line, dropped, and stopped two 
feet from the hole. I made the hole in two, 
while he took a three. 

The rest of the story is quickly told. I was 
a bom golfer! My ancestors must have been 
golfers for a thousand years! I at once joined 
the Tuscumbia Golf Club at Green Lake, Wis- 
consin. On returning home, Mr. Fay and Mr. 
James Deering saw that I had the stock required 
to join the Chicago Golf Club. And now, my 
six golf clubs are sometimes not enough! 

I have made holes in one, but that first shot 
was my best. It taught me several lessons, and 
one always remembers what one cannot forget. 

Since that time, while pensively smoking my 
"manilla," I have often thought how little of 
real golf enthusiasm Norman Fay had in the 
early nineties. 



CHAPTER XXIII 
IN THE CLUB LIBRARY 

It's Hey for a Game 

IT'S up and away from our work to-day, 
For the breeze sweeps over the down; 
And it 's hey for a game where the gorse blossoms 
flame, 
And the bracken is bronzing to brown. 
With the turf 'neath our tread and the blue over- 
head, 
And the song of the lark in the whin; 
There's the flag and the green, with the bunkers 
between — 
Now will you be over or in? 

A. Conan Doyle 

Old Lines, but True to Golf as Well 

Natiu-e never hurries: atom by atom, little 
by little, she achieves her work. The lesson 
one learns in fishing, yachting, hunting or planting 
is the manners of Nature; patience with many 
delays. — Emerson. 

Try It 

The following doesn't cost a penny and may 
help yoiu- game: "There is profit in a smile, — 
usually the world returns it. The tone of voice 
you use will ordinarily receive its like. A frown 
will encourage a frown from others. Sing, and 

263 
18 



264 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

charming company will want you. Think, and 
thinkers will entertain you. Seeking for the 
good, in and for those you know, will be 
rewarded with loving friends, and all nature will 
conspire to vouchsafe you treasure." 

He Ought to Know 

To brag little. 

To show well, 

To crow gently if in luck, 

To pay up. 

To own up, and 

To shut up if beaten. 

Are the virtues of a sporting man. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes 

The Good Points of Golf 
It gives to the bad the sleep of the just. 
It lays the proud low in the bimker of dust; 
It raises the humble to sit in the lap 
Of fortime made kind by a fair handicap. 
For the man of adventure 't is balm to his soul 
To get himself happily into a hole . . . 
Then let out your elbows and swing your club free, 
And don't press your game with a "drat" and 
a"D." Duke of Argyll 

The Greatest Benefits 

It is just at a time like this — Christmas here 
again, another great golfing year all but done, and 
now in this firelit loneliness seeming to creep out 
from the back of somewhere and ask plaintively 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 265 

for a kind word of sympathy and commenda- 
tion and thanks to be said to it — that one feels 
that happy kind of sadness that is associated 
with these reflections as with no others. It does 
seem to me, that if each one of us, players, sat 
alone for an hoiir at the end of the year and made 
a deliberate reckoning of the acts of friendship 
performed in connection with this game in which 
he had been interested, of the special displays of 
brotherly feeling that it had brought about, of 
the strengthening of some old bonds that it 'had 
accomplished, of the general happiness and 
good will that it had engendered for his benefit, 
he would see that he had his golf to thank for 
much more than health and exercise. I do know 
some men of sense, who would say that health 
and exercise and the enjoyment of the sport, 
great as they are, yet are not the greatest of the 
benefits of golf. — Henry Leach in ^'Letters of a 
Modern Golfer to his Grandfather.'' 

We 'll be Happy To-day 

Come youth and come age, from the study or 
stage, 

From Bar or from Bench — high or low! 
A green you must use as a cure for the blues — 

You drive them away as they go. 
We 're outward bound on a long, long round. 

And it's time to be up and away: 
If worry and sorrow come back with the morrow. 

At least we'll be happy to-day. 

A. Conan Doyle 



266 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Golf and Life 

Keep your eye on the ball. 
Keep straight. 
Keep in the course. 
Take time. 
Do not press. 
Not up, not in. 
Do not lose heart. 
Be temperate in all things, and 
Keep your temper or you will lose your game. 

Lord Avebury 

Favorites 

A golfer's favorite clubs are never made to 
order; they are picked up here and there acci- 
dentally, in the course of many years. There is 
the right club for every man somewhere in the 
world. He must watch and wait until he finds 
it, and then persevere with it until he is its 
master. — Golfer's Calendar. 

Four Words 

Golf teaches one to have: 

Integrity, — to be just. 
Intelligence, — to seek aright. 
Patience, — to endure. 
Philosophy, — to be calm. 

The Value of Rational Occupation 

Mr. Geo. M. Reynolds, president of the 
Continental and Commercial National Bank, 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 267 

perhaps was not thinking about golf when he 
wrote this, but the busy man who plays golf 
can find food for reflection in it: 

"We hear no end of talk about the strain 
put on Americans to-day by their intense activity, 
and when a man breaks down the world is solemnly 
informed that overwork did it. As a matter of 
fact in a majority of instances it is not overwork 
but work plus dissipation, or dissipation without 
work, or, if the word dissipation is too strong, say 
imprudence of one sort or another, or vacuous 
aimlessness. There is nothing so healthful as 
congenial emplo3niient, and the normal man can 
stand an almost unlimited amount of it, always 
provided he has the amount of food and sleep 
and care of his person that Nature reasonably 
demands." 

Woman on the Links 

Aside from her home, a woman is most 
charming on the links. Even there, she is at 
her best when animated and bright. A tear may 
move pity, but it is a smile that commands 
admiration. She must not be forever sparkling — 
that is monotonous and wearing. She must 
have her sober moments, if only to throw into 
higher relief the moments when she is gay. A 
woman is most charming when she is tender and 
sympathetic. When her voice takes a softened 
tone and her eyes look words that her lips hesitate 
to say — then, if she only knew her power, it 
would be a bad time for the world at large! 



268 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Nothing Like It 

A writer on golf, whose ability was by no 
means equal to his conceit, was discoiirsing at 
length upon the merits of his work. 

"I am .tired of writing of that which others 
write of," he said. "I want to create an original 
work, something that no one has ever written 
about or ever will write about." 

"Why not write your own eiilogy?" said one of 
his companions. 

Don't Believe It 

When a golfer tells you something he said to 
somebody who was rude to him, don't believe 
half of it. The chances are, he is only telling 
you what he thought afterward would have 
been great to say, if he had thought of it and 
had dared. 

This Makes It Quite Clear 

Honus: Golf is not labor if you know how to 
play. The way I play, it's great amusement. 

Heine: For everybody that watches you. I 
should like to play golf with you if you would 
let me be the caddie. 

Honus: That shows what you know about 
golf. I bet you don't even know what a caddie is. 

Heine : A caddie is a fellow you take along and 
pay money to for doing less work than you do 
yourself for nothing. Is golf anything like 
baseball ? 

Honus: Yes; only in baseball you are expected 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 269 

to hit the ball, and in golf, when you hit it, it 's a 
surprise. 

Heine: And in baseball you can't walk unless 
you get four balls; in golf, no matter how many 
balls you get, you got to keep walking all the time, 

Honus: There's one thing about golf. It 
increases your vocabulary. 

Heine: I thought it made you thinner. 

Honus: I mean your language. 

Heine: How? 

Honus : When you swing all your might at that 
little ball and miss it, I tell you you can think of 
more things to say than you ever thought of in 
yotir life. 

Heine: Oh, I see; that's why people play golf 
to get off fat. They don't sweat it off — they 
swear it off. 

Honus : Golf is a great reducer. 

Heine: Of the pocketbook? 

Honus: The principal expense is the balls. 

Heine: The highballs? 

Honus: No; golf balls. But nobody needs to 
worry about the expense of anything any more. 

Heine: Why not? 

Honus: A great German professor has just 
discovered a way to make diamonds out of gas. 

Heine: That's nothing. Look at some of 
these chalk-talk lectiu-ers. Think of all the 
money thay make with nothing but gas. 

Honus: But this is not human gas; it's plain, 
ordinary illimiinating gas. Such as you use in 
your fiat. 



2 70 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Heine: No wonder our gas bills are so high. 

Honus: Every time you light the gas you are 
burning up a diamond. 

Heine : From the way the gas company charges 
for the gas they must have discovered that long 
before the professor did. 

Honus: No; he is the first one to prove it. 
He deserves a lot of credit. 

Heine: What has that to do with golf? 

Honus: Any one with diamonds and gas can 
play golf fine in the club cafe. 

Heine: I don't beHeve it. 

Honus: All right. You carry that doubtful 
Thomas spirit with you all yotu" life, and some 
day you'll die. — Aaron Ho_ffman. 

Was He Thinking of the Ball? 

"Then marvel not, thou great and complete 
man, 
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax; 
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye 
than what not stirs . . . . " 

Shakespeare. 



Almost any woman one meets — on the golf 
links, in the street, or at an entertainment 
— is better than the man next to her, on 
either side, in front of, or following her. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

AT THE NINETEENTH HOLE 

Where was the Victory? 

ONE day Mr. Walter H. Wilson of the Chicago 
Golf Club was playing on that course, with 
three friends. 

He was about to approach the tenth hole. 
There was a workman rolling the green who 
proved to be a new man. Mr. Wilson called: 
"Fore!" The workman paid no attention. 

Again he called, with the same result. Then 
he called in truly stentorian Wilsonian tones: 
"Four! Five! Seven! Eleven!" Nothing 
doing. The man and his work went on like 
Tennyson's ' ' Brook ' ' — forever. 

The players moved up closer, and demanded 
to know what the man meant. According to 
the workman, he was sent out by Dave Foulis, 
the club "pro," to work on that green and he 
intended to work there; he did n't see as he ought 
to be interfered with by a lot of men who were n't 
working — merely playing. 

The man's point of view and fidelity to his in- 
structions and understanding of what work meant 
•was so imique, if not modem, that Mr. Wilson 
and his friends, bowing graceftilly to the dignity 
of labor, agreed to call the hole a tie, picked up 
their balls, and assembled on the eleventh tee. 

271 



2 72 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

How Did He Make Money ? 

George: What a fine golfer Remsen is. He 
is very rich, I iinderstand. How did he make 
his money? 

Charles: His game is good, but he made his 
money out of the blood, aches, and groans of his 
fellowmen; out of the grief of crying children 
and the woes of wailing women. 

George : Ah ! I see, — a loan shark. 

Charles: Oh, no; he's a dentist. 

Absent Minded 

On the way to the first tee. 
Edna: Mabel, do you think a married man 
makes the best husband? 

Mabel: No, dear; very few do. 

Didn't Know He Swore 

A player on a southern golf course swore, 
seemingly imconsciously, before other players, cad- 
dies, and women. In addition, when playing, he 
had a voice that could be heard by fellow mem- 
bers four holes in advance or behind. 

When the directors of the club proposed to take 
the matter up for discipline an influential director, 
who was anything but profane, argued that the 
man did n't know when he swore, or that his tones 
were more than whispers. The argument was 
overpowering, and the swearing member was 
saved for a time. 

One day the influential director and the profane 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 



273 



member were playing together. Having heard 
of the complaint against him and desiring to 
impress his friend, the profane member went 
through the game to the sixteenth hole without 
opening his mouth. 

This remarkable change had a demoralizing 
effect on the director's game. He was "all in 
the air." When, on the sixteenth green, his 
twelve-foot putt was fourteen feet over the hole, 
he exclaimed to his opponent in terrible earnest- 
ness: "For heaven's sake, man, swear!" 

His Foolish Fear 
"Sweetheart, would you marry a man who 
loves to play golf, and who would ask for an occa- 
sional afternoon or day away from you, but more 




The legislature will soon be petitioned to investigate the 
hitherto unsuspected brutality of golf players 



2 74 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

especially whose income was under $5 ,000 a year ? ' ' 

"How much under?" she replied. 

"Well, quite a bit." 

"Is it between $3,000 and $5,000?" 

"I might put it that way." 

"Dearest! Why did you think I would let 
money stand in the way?" 

Self-Consciousness 

An egotistical golfer, who believes himself the 
center of ever5rthing that exists and everjrthing 
that takes place, said to his friend one day: 
" It is only to me that such misfortunes happen. ' ' 
"What," asked the friend, "is the matter?" 
" Don't you see that it is raining? " he answered. 

Money Talks 

"Money talks all right," remarked the golf 
philosopher, "but it never said anything to me 
except 'Tag.'" 

Have You Heard the Latest? 

Not long ago a well-known player entered the 
nineteenth hole at "The Club" and with voice 
filled with enthusiasm remarked, so all coiild hear : 

"Well, I have just gone aroimd with the most 
wonderfiil player I ever had as an opponent!" 

"What did he do?" called out half a dozen in 
imison. 

"Why, every shot was accurate; his drives 
were straight down the course ; his brassie or iron 
right on the green, never more than two putts 



PRO AND CON OF GOLF 275 

on the green, and eight or ten holes in one putt! 
It was the most phenomenal plajdng I have ever 
seen!" 

"Marvelous!" one man remarked. "How 
much did he beat you?" 

"Beat me? He was never in it from the time 
we drove from the first tee. I beat him three 
up and two to play." 

Is Your New Story Old ? 

A few months ago I was telling the above 
story to a group of New Yorkers in the charming 
loimging room of the Garden City Golf Club, 
Long Island. Having recently heard it, I felt 
reasonably sure of springing a new one. One of 
the group was Walter J. Travis. I noticed it 
was not received with the enthusiasm the story 
had met with on other occasions. The reason 
for this I discovered when Mr. Travis, in his usual 
deliberate way, removed his black cigar and 
qmetly said: 

"That happened twelve years ago at Appa- 
wamis,^ and I was present." Continuing, he 
gave the names of the participants, recalling the 
exact words used. 

The story, therefore, however new somewhere, 
was old at Garden City. I immediately bottled 
up a number of other stories I thought 
choice. So it is that "new stories" are old if 
one is imfortimate in picking the wrong place to 
tell them. 

1 1 think this was the club he mentioned, although I may be mistaken. 



2 76 PRO AND CON OF GOLF 

Back to the Land 

"Serve the champagne in tin cups, Oscar." 

"Very good, sir!" 

" These golfers Hke to rough it a little, you know." 

Where Ignorance is Bliss 

"Is there anything Panhard doesn't know- 
about golf?" 

"Well, if there is, he does n't know it." 

His Chief Accomplishments 

Housewife: You may be a person of culture, 
as you say, but you surely do not look the part. 

Wa3^side Wally: You might give me a chance 
to display my accomplishments. 

Housewife: What' are they, may I ask? 

Wayside Wally: Well, for one thing, I am 
a good golfer and an excellent after-dinner 
speaker. 

Failed to Make It 

An Irishman standing near and watching some 
players driving toward a 140- yard hole remarked 
that ' ' any one ought to be able to do it. " He was 
offered a club for a trial shot by one of the players. 
Although very awkward, to the surprise of all his 
shot went true. They could all see that, appar- 
ently, the ball was about six inches from the hole. 

With keen disappointment reflected in his 
voice, the Irishman said: "Begorra! I missed 
it!" 



Old Lines, but Fitting the Well- 
played Game 

So let the way wind up the hill or down, 

O'er rough or smooth, the journey will be joy. 
Still seeking what I sought when but a boy, 

New friendship, high adventure, and a crown, 
My heart will keep the courage of her quest, 
And hope the road's last turn will be the best. 

Van Dyke 



